What is the Crisis?
Cal-Am is proposing to build six to nine slant wells in an experimental desalination project on the Cemex sand mining plant in Marina. The desal project is a component of the Monterey Peninsula Water Supply Project (MPWSP) that has been presented as a "regional" solution, ultimately providing water to the Cal-Am ratepayers, none of whom live in Marina.
Illegally taking from one jurisdiction to solely benefit another, is NOT a regional solution!
Illegally taking from one jurisdiction to solely benefit another, is NOT a regional solution!
Map of Proposed Slant Well Project
The map below shows the entire scale of the project that will disrupt Marina for years but serve no part of Marina. The 7 slant wells are on the left at the coastline. The blue lines are the actual pipes that will pump the groundwater and seawater for the desalination plant. The slant well development will permanently destroy 4 acres of environmentally sensitive dunes habitat that is home to several threatened and endangered species and impact several more acres with roads and service requirements. There is likely to be NO PUBLIC ACCESS to the beach as promised in the CEMEX sand plant closure settlement agreement. Lines in red mark out where MOST OF DEL MONTE AVENUE and Lapis Road will be torn up to put in pipelines to move the water to the peninsula. This may be a TWO YEAR PROCESS. The actual desalination plant will be built on Charlie Benson Road near the landfill. It is shown on the top right of the map at the end of the red pipline. Access to the landfill, Last Chance and the Materials Recycling Facility will be impaired during construction. Marina will have all of the disruptions, CO2 emissions, noise, smells and environmental impacts of this project to serve peninsula interests.
Below is a misrepresentation of the slant well, produced by Cal-Am; it gives the impression that the slant well will be accessing “subsurface ocean” water…the pipes are extending way out under the ocean floor and not very far inland.
In reality, the pipes are much further inland and are drawing from our subsurface groundwater, and NOT from subsurface ocean, as Cal-Am would like us to believe.
The red line and added "x"s indicate where the screened filters that draw groundwater into the pipes are located; these were added by Just Water.
This diagram gives an approximate visual description of where the water will be drawing from along the pipe; it is not just from the terminus (the end) of the pipe.
Note how most of the pipe is NOT directly under the ocean floor. They are below the inland surface and will draw directly from the 180’ aquifer!
The red line and added "x"s indicate where the screened filters that draw groundwater into the pipes are located; these were added by Just Water.
This diagram gives an approximate visual description of where the water will be drawing from along the pipe; it is not just from the terminus (the end) of the pipe.
Note how most of the pipe is NOT directly under the ocean floor. They are below the inland surface and will draw directly from the 180’ aquifer!
Groundwater rights in the Salinas Valley Groundwater Basin have long been established for decades by legal contracts; Cal-Am will clearly be accessing our groundwater and the water in our aquifers without any water rights!
SUMMARY: Cal-Am’s Slant Well Desalination Project’s source water is NOT ocean water but will be from our groundwater, Marina Coast Water District’s sole source of potable water for:
- City of Marina
- Northern third of Seaside
- The Ord Military Community
- East Garrison
- CSU Monterey Bay
- Small parts of Del Rey Oaks and Monterey
These areas and Marina are all served with groundwater from the Salinas basin by one agency: Marina Coast Water District (MCWD).
Cal-Am has the Highest Rates of Water in the Country for the Monterey Peninsula!
CA Public Utilities Commission has approved all Cal-Am’s rate increases to their customers on the Peninsula such that now their rates are the highest in the country!
There are Regional Water Solutions!
- Cal-Am has over pumped the Carmel River and the Seaside Basin, both of which they had legal rights to pump, and now, without adequate water because of restrictions placed on them, they wish to invade our water source without any water rights!
- There ARE other solutions to the Peninsula water problems that are being worked on right now but Cal-Am is determined to build their slant well project at the Marina site!
In Summary:
- Cal-Am’s proposed Slant Well Project will take 24.1 million gallons a day at maximum build-out! The source water is NOT ocean water but from our groundwater, Marina Coast Water District’s sole source of potable water for residents of Marina, the Ord communities and part of Seaside!
- This water is from the Salinas Valley Groundwater Basin, one of California’s 21 critically overdrafted basins!
- Cal-Am has NO water rights to our water!
- Cal-Am claims their project will do no harm to our groundwater basin BUT their claims are based on their erroneous and sloppy science!
- Marina Coast Water District (MCWD) has invested in a state-of-the-art groundwater imaging called AEM that shows there will be harm to our groundwater!
- There will be harm to Marina! (go to "how does science help us?" to understand why we must use AEM data)
- The approving body for this project, the California Public Utilities Commission will not consider this new scientific information OR the basic issue of water rights!
- CA Public Utilities Commission has approved all Cal-Am’s rate increases to their customers on the Peninsula such that now their rates are the highest in the country!
WE DO NOT NEED THE CAL-AM SLANT WELL
DESALINATION PLANT IN MARINA!
DESALINATION PLANT IN MARINA!
Sometime by June/July, 2018, the CA Public Utilities Commission will decide wether to approve this project. If they approve this project, they will issue a Certificate of Public Necessity permit that will allow Cal-Am to begin building!