Drought Alert issued for Roseville

Today, the City of Roseville’s Environmental Utilities Department activated a Stage One Drought alert within the Roseville city limits in response to a letter received from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR) which reduced Roseville’s water supply for the 2008 calendar year by 25 percent.

Roseville”s normal year water supply from Folsom Reservoir is 32,000 acre feet, with an additional 10,000 acre feet available through a Placer County Water Agency contract and 400 acre feet in groundwater.  Current water demand is estimated to be 35,600 acre feet in Roseville, leaving Roseville with a water deficit of 1,200 acre feet of water. 

A Stage One Drought Alert does the following:

Increase water waste patrols to ensure water is being used efficiently and leaks in residential and commercial properties are repaired per the Roseville Municipal Code;

• Request all city water users to reduce their water use by 10 percent.
• Prohibit the washing of streets, parking lots, driveways, sidewalks or buildings, unless public health requires it.  This does not apply to street sweepers.

Request restaurants not serve water, except upon request.  ‘We are asking our residents and businesses to do their part and make changes in their water use to achieve a 10 percent reduction in 2008,’ said Derrick Whitehead, Director of Environmental Utilities.  ‘We have a whole host of free water conservation programs and generous rebates that residents and businesses can take advantage of that will help us reach the 10 percent reduction in water use.’ 

USBR reduced Roseville”s water supply due to lower than expected snow melt to Folsom Reservoir, Roseville’s main water source, two previous dry years that have brought the lake level to a very low elevation and competing water needs from Folsom Reservoir.  Area lakes, like Folsom, provide many functions other than water supply.  In addition, they provide cold water for sustaining spawning of endangered species, such as Chinook and Steelhead Salmon, provide water quality maintenance for the delta and agriculture water to produce food.  Water system managers from the USBR are now projecting there may not be enough water to meet all these objectives, so a reduction was required 

Over the past few years, the City of Roseville has been expanding its water conservation programs and has heavily invested in an Aquifer Storage and Recovery (ASR) Program to add further reliability to Roseville’s water supply.  The ASR program consists of a series of wells that are capable of injecting treated drinking water in the ground during times of abundant supply and extract water when supply is limited.  The ASR program recently finished a test phase and is seeking approval from the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board to fully implement the program.   

‘Development of our ASR program has been in preparation of the fact that we knew it wasn”t a matter of if there would be a drought, but when,’ said Jim Gray, Mayor of Roseville.  ‘This multi-year investment in water conservation programs and ASR will help us deal with the situation if it worsens, but we cannot do it alone.  Everyone in Roseville needs to do their part to help meet the 10 percent water use reduction goal.’ 

The city will be mailing letters to all households and businesses in Roseville in the next few weeks regarding the drought stage requirements and will be increasing public outreach and marketing visibility over the next year.