Cambria’s WRF Production. The numbers don’t add up.

The current San Luis Obispo County Coastal Development Permit application for the WRF will allow the addition of at least 650 new residential water service connections, although the application does not provide any evidence that adequate additional water is available to provide water security to existing or new customers during drought conditions.  

How will we avoid future water shortage emergencies by building at least 650 more houses AND supplying drought protection water for current residences AND protecting the San Simeon Creek habitats AND honoring the adjacent landowner’s long-established senior water rights?  It’s not possible to do all this out of the San Simeon Creek aquifer, so something will have to give. 

A permit for additional water connections without proof of available water makes no sense. 

The following points illustrate the lack of proof:

• The amount of purified water supplied by the facility to the injection well is limited by the sustainable pumping rate from the percolation ponds.  Pumping at a faster rate than the percolation ponds are refilled with treated water from the wastewater treatment plant, lowers the water level in the percolation ponds. Failure to maintain adequate water levels in the percolation ponds allows saltwater to contaminate the aquifer and increases loss of fresh water from the aquifer into the ocean.

• The stated percolation pond pumping rate of 581 gallons per minute (gpm) is approximately twice the 275 gpm rate of percolation pond recharge from the wastewater treatment plant (Ref CDM Smith groundwater modeling report).

• The EWS/WRF can supply an average of 233 gpm of purified water to the aquifer injection well (not 400 gpm as claimed), pumping 275 gpm from the percolation ponds, with no pumping from Warren Ranch well 9P4, and no mitigation pumping to the lagoon.

• Assuming that 50% of the water injected into the aquifer is delivered to customers (as stated in the project documents) that will amount to 116 gpm or 180 acre-feet produced in six months, operating the facility 24/7. This situation contradicts the Project Description for Coastal Development Permit application’s claim that the WRF can produce 250 acre-feet in six months, with an additional 62 acre-feet of water to recharge the San Simeon Creek lagoon.

Obtaining a regular coastal development permit for providing water security to existing customers only during drought conditions makes sense until the adverse impacts of expanded operation are fully understood and mitigated.