Title
Consider approving a Return Water Purchase Agreement; and authorizing the General Manager to execute the Return Water Purchase Agreement substantially in the form attached, subject to County Counsel approval.
Report
RECOMMENDATION:
It is recommended that the Monterey County Water Resources Agency Board of Supervisors:
Approve a Return Water Purchase Agreement; and, authorize the General Manager to execute the Return Water Purchase Agreement substantially in the form attached, subject to County Counsel approval.
SUMMARY:
The Agency Board of Directors and Agency Board of Supervisors approved, on January 25, 2016 and February 2, 2016, respectively, a Return Water Planning Term Sheet ("Term Sheet"), outlining the principles concerning an arrangement under which California American Water Company ("Cal-Am") would provide Desalination Plant Return Water to Castroville Community Services District ("CCSD") and the Agency's Castroville Seawater Intrusion Project ("CSIP"). Use of this water will serve to decrease groundwater pumping by CCSD and the Agency.
The Term Sheet anticipated that certain Parties to the Term Sheet would negotiate and enter into water purchase agreements under which Cal-Am would deliver Return Water. This Return Water Purchase Agreement is now the result of those negotiations.
DISCUSSION:
Cal-Am proposes a Monterey Peninsula Water Supply Project ("MPWSP" or "Project") which includes a desalination plant that will provide a potable water supply for Cal-Am's Monterey Peninsula service area. Rather than using an open-ocean intake that would produce only seawater as source water for the desalination plant, the Project desalination plant will produce its source water from subterranean slant wells drilled adjacent to the ocean, which will draw water from strata underlying the ocean. The location of the wells overlies the western portion of the Salinas River Groundwater Basin (SRGB"). The ratio of seawater to brackish SRGB...
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