Residents have been ordered to minimize outdoor watering.
Today, Southern California officials ordered residents in Los Angeles, Ventura, and San Bernardino to begin cutting down on their water consumption, specifically in regards to outdoor watering. As temperatures rise due to climate change, California is anticipating extreme drought conditions this coming summer. As such, officials are calling on residents to cut water consumption by about 35% now in order to ensure they don’t have to ban it entirely once summer begins.
“This is a crisis. This is unprecedented. We have never done anything like this before and because we haven’t seen this situation happen like this before, we don’t have enough water to meet normal demands for the six million people living in the State Water Project dependent areas,” said Adel Hagekhalil, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
According to Hagekhalil, outdoor watering “takes 50% to 70% of (residents’) water consumption. We are asking people to reduce that water almost by half, if not more.”
Last year, California faced a summer heat of unprecedented levels, bringing on the most severe drought seen in the last 126 years. With temperatures still rising, it is entirely possible for the state to break that grim record again, which means the water levels need to be strictly monitored and controlled.
“If we don’t do the actions that we need today to stretch our water… the Metropolitan board has given me the authority to ban all watering as soon as September first,” Hagekhalil warned.
