Experts agree that cities need diverse water supplies, but desalination plants remain controversial.
Once again, California is in a drought. Much of Northern California and the Central Valley are experiencing “acute water supply shortfalls,” and the Sierra Nevada snowpack, a critical water source for Californians up and down the state during the dry season, is all but gone already—just 6% of normal for this time of year.
California’s water system, already stressed by the dueling needs of massive urban centers and its agricultural sector, is crumbling in the face of climate change. The state’s climate is becoming increasingly unstable, oscillating between periods of drought and deluge, which is making the water supply hard to predict. To make sure they can deliver enough water to California’s farms and cities going forward, water managers are focusing on shoring up local supplies.
But not everyone agrees on the best way to do that. Nowhere is this clearer than in Orange County’s Huntington Beach, the site of a proposed desalination plant.
First proposed in the late 1990s by Poseidon Water, which has developed several large-scale desalination facilities around the world, including one just down the coast in Carlsbad, the Huntington Beach project has been beset by shifting permitting regulations, legal challenges, and political turmoil for decades