Changes in water consumption linked to heavy news media coverage of extreme climatic events

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) | October 25th, 2017

Public awareness of water- and drought-related issues is an important yet relatively unexplored component of water use behavior. To examine this relationship, w

Public awareness of water- and drought-related issues is an important yet relatively unexplored component of water use behavior. To examine this relationship, we first quantified news media coverage of drought in California from 2005 to 2015, a period with two distinct droughts; the later drought received unprecedentedly high media coverage, whereas the earlier drought did not, as the United States was experiencing an economic downturn coinciding with a historic presidential election. Comparing this coverage to Google search frequency confirmed that public attention followed news media trends. We then modeled single-family residential water consumption in 20 service areas in the San Francisco Bay Area during the same period using geospatially explicit data and including news media coverage as a covariate. Model outputs revealed the factors affecting water use for populations of varying demographics. Importantly, the models estimated that an increase of 100 drought-related articles in a bimonthly period was associated with an 11 to 18% reduction in water use. Then, we evaluated high-resolution water consumption data from smart meters, known as advanced metering infrastructure, in one of the previously modeled service areas to evaluate breakpoints in water use trends. Results demonstrated that whereas nonresidential commercial irrigation customers responded to changes in climate, single-family residential customers decreased water use at the fastest rate following heavy drought-related news media coverage. These results highlight the need for water resource planners and decision makers to further consider the importance of effective, internally and externally driven, public awareness and education in water demand behavior and management.

Changing the course? What's worked, what hasn't and what's next for the SCWP: An assessment of the first three rounds of the Safe Clean Water Program

Los Angeles Waterkeeper (LA Waterkeeper) | February 16th, 2023

In 2018, Los Angeles County voters overwhelmingly approved “Measure W” — a 2.5 cent per square foot parcel tax on impervious surface on all land parcels within the

In 2018, Los Angeles County voters overwhelmingly approved “Measure W” — a 2.5 cent per square foot parcel tax on impervious surface on all land parcels within the LA County Flood Control District to fund multi-benefit stormwater infrastructure. The Safe Clean Water Program (SCWP) was developed to distribute and manage the funds raised, approximately $280M annually. The SCWP operates through three distinct programs: the District Program (10% of funds), the Municipal Program (40% of funds), and the Regional Program (50% of funds). The Regional Program has recently completed its third round of funding awarded through a competitive grant process. This assessment focuses on how the Regional Program is performing in achieving the SCWP’s overarching goals of water quality, water supply, and community investment benefits as provided in the ordinance authorizing this measure for the ballot. It also explores how well the program is meeting its goals around community engagement and support, benefits to disadvantaged communities, and green workforce development. The purpose of this assessment is to help the SCWP’s Regional Oversight Committee (ROC) and ultimately other decision-makers such as the LA County Board of Supervisors better understand what is working well with the program and where improvements could be made as part of the biennial review.

Community and Grower Engagement in Multibenefit Land Repurposing

Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) | June 10th, 2022

Defining urban resilience: A review

Landscape and Urban Planing (Elsevier) | March 1st, 2016

Fostering resilience in the face of environmental, socioeconomic, and political uncertainty and risk has captured the attention of academics and decision makers across di

Fostering resilience in the face of environmental, socioeconomic, and political uncertainty and risk has captured the attention of academics and decision makers across disciplines, sectors, and scales. Resilience has become an important goal for cities, particularly in the face of climate change. Urban areas house the majority of the world's population, and, in addition to functioning as nodes of resource consumption and as sites for innovation, have become laboratories for resilience, both in theory and in practice. This paper reviews the scholarly literature on urban resilience and concludes that the term has not been well defined. Existing definitions are inconsistent and underdeveloped with respect to incorporation of crucial concepts found in both resilience theory and urban theory. Based on this literature review, and aided by bibliometric analysis, the paper identifies six conceptual tensions fundamental to urban resilience: (1) definition of ‘urban’; (2) understanding of system equilibrium; (3) positive vs. neutral (or negative) conceptualizations of resilience; (4) mechanisms for system change; (5) adaptation versus general adaptability; and (6) timescale of action. To advance this burgeoning field, more conceptual clarity is needed. This paper, therefore, proposes a new definition of urban resilience. This definition takes explicit positions on these tensions, but remains inclusive and flexible enough to enable uptake by, and collaboration among, varying disciplines. The paper concludes with a discussion of how the definition might serve as a boundary object, with the acknowledgement that applying resilience in different contexts requires answering: Resilience for whom and to what? When? Where? And why?

Department of the Interior Nature-Based Solutions Roadmap

Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability (Duke University) | December 1st, 2023

Estimation of residential outdoor water use in Los Angeles, California

Landscape and Urban Planing (Elsevier) | July 1st, 2014

The current study analyzes existing methods for estimating outdoor use and landscape irrigation in highly developed residential areas across Los Angeles. Outdoor use was

The current study analyzes existing methods for estimating outdoor use and landscape irrigation in highly developed residential areas across Los Angeles. Outdoor use was estimated using three methods: two methods described by the Pacific Institute and a third approach that utilizes remotely sensed vegetation and water billing data. Monthly individual water use records were provided by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) for 2000–2010. This period includes voluntary and mandatory restrictions due to drought conditions across the state. Records were aggregated to the census tract level to protect customer privacy. The two Pacific Institute methods, which are based on water billing data, generally underestimate outdoor use due to assumptions that the lowest water consumption month represents indoor use, which is likely not the case in Los Angeles. The remote-sensing model developed between single-family water use and the Landsat normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) surplus performed well in greener areas of the city and indicates that landscape irrigation use represents 54% of total single-family water use. The model also predicts an average decrease in landscaping irrigation of 6% and by 35% during voluntary and mandatory restrictions, respectively. Voluntary conservation and mandatory waste restrictions were less effective for higher income groups in the city, while more stringent pricing and non-pricing mandatory restrictions in FY2010 had similar effects across income groups. Study results contribute to a better understanding of the partitioning of Los Angeles residential water use and can be utilized to evaluate pricing structures and target water conservation efforts.

Evaluating effects of potential urban water use efficiency standards (AB 1668-SB 606) on urban retail water suppliers, wastewater management agencies, and urban landscapes (trees and urban parklands)**

California State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) | January 15th, 2022

Click here for the draft report segment on wastewater.

Click here for the draft report segment on wastewater.

Evaluating the Effects of Turf-Replacement Programs in Los Angeles County

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) | August 4th, 2017

In 2014, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) undertook an unprecedented investment to incentive turf replacement throughout Southern California i

In 2014, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) undertook an unprecedented investment to incentive turf replacement throughout Southern California in response to the state’s serious drought. MWD devoted $350 million to the program, resulting in more than 46,000 rebate payments to remove 165 million square feet of turf. The funding boost served as a tremendous natural experiment to better understand the effects turf replacement programs. As part of an evaluation of this program, UCLA and the University of Utah examined socio-economic and demographic characteristics of program participation and assessed changes in vegetation and landscapes of front yards resulting from turf replacement. We examined address-level records of 24,921 participants who applied for turf replacement rebates between February 2014 and April 2016 in Los Angeles (LA) County. We analyzed the socioeconomic and spatial determinants of program participation. Further, we used Google Earth Street View to characterize the landscapes and plants resulting from turf replacement based on a set of randomly selected participating properties. We ascertained the types of turf replacements that were installed and developed a classification system for landscape design types.

Evapotranspiration of urban landscapes in Los Angeles, California at the municipal scale

American Geophysical Union (AGU) | May 24th, 2017

Evapotranspiration (ET), an essential process in biosphere-atmosphere interactions, is highly uncertain in cities that maintain cultivated and irrigated landscapes. We e

Evapotranspiration (ET), an essential process in biosphere-atmosphere interactions, is highly uncertain in cities that maintain cultivated and irrigated landscapes. We estimated ET of irrigated landscapes in Los Angeles by combining empirical models of turfgrass ET and tree transpiration derived from in situ measurements with previously developed remotely sensed estimates of vegetation cover and ground-based vegetation surveys. We modeled irrigated landscapes as a two-component system comprised of trees and turfgrass to assess annual and spatial patterns of ET. Annual ET from vegetated landscapes (ETveg) was 11106 53 mm/yr and ET from the whole city (vegetated and nonvegetated areas, ETland) was three times smaller, reflecting the fractional vegetation cover. With the exception of May and June, monthly ETland was significantly higher than predicted by the North American Land Data Assimilation System. ETveg  was close to potential ET, indicating abundant irrigation inputs. Monthly averaged ETveg varied from 1.560.1 mm/d (December) to 4.360.2 mm/d (June). Turfgrass was responsible for 70% of ETveg. For trees, angiosperm species (71% of all trees) contributed over 90% to total tree transpiration, while coniferous and palm species made very small contributions. ETland was linearly correlated with median household income across the city, confirming the importance of social factors in determining spatial distribution of urban vegetation. These estimates have important implications for constraining the municipal water budget of Los Angeles and improving regional-scale hydrologic models, as well as for developing water-saving practices. The methodology used in this study is also transferable to other semiarid regions for quantification of urban landscape ET.

Green Infrastructure Planning for the City of Richmond with GreenPlan-IT

San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) | November 1st, 2018

The City of Richmond, via the San Francisco Municipal Regional Stormwater Permit (MRP), is required to develop and implement a Green Infrastructure (GI) Master Plan to re

The City of Richmond, via the San Francisco Municipal Regional Stormwater Permit (MRP), is required to develop and implement a Green Infrastructure (GI) Master Plan to reduce stormwater mercury and PCB loads. This project used GreenPlan-IT, a planning tool developed by the San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) and regional partners, to identify feasible and cost-effective GI locations within the City boundary to support the development of GI Plans for permit compliance.  GreenPlan-IT comprises four distinct tools: (a) a GIS-based Site Locator Tool that combines the physical properties of different GI types with local and regional GIS information to identify and rank potential GI locations; (b) a Modeling Tool that is built on SWMM5 to establish baseline conditions and quantify anticipated runoff and pollutant load reductions from GI implementation; (c) an Optimization Tool that uses an evolutionary algorithm to identify the best combinations of GI types and numbers of sites within a study area for achieving flow and load reduction goals; and (d) a Tracker Tool that tracks GI implementation and reports the cumulative programmatic outcomes for regulatory compliance and other communication needs.