Urban Demand and Supply Planning

EKI supports urban water management planning including the development of Urban Water Management Plans (UWMPs), Water Shortage Contingency Plans (WSCPs), and Water Supply Assessments (WSAs) throughout California.

The Urban Water Management Plan Act and amendments require urban water suppliers to prepare a UWMP every five years to support their long-term water resource planning and to ensure that adequate water supplies are available to meet existing and future water demands. The UWMP is a foundational document and source of information about a supplier’s historical and projected water demands, water supplies, supply reliability and potential vulnerabilities, water shortage contingency planning, and demand management programs. Among other things, it is used as a long-range planning document for water supply and system planning as well as a source for data on population, housing, water demands, water supplies, and capital improvement projects.

EKI prepares comprehensive and inclusive UWMPs that are developed through a collaborative process with agency staff. EKI prepared 43 UWMPS during the 2020 cycle for various cities and agencies across California. These agencies span a range of characteristics and include everything from large urban retailers to small rural retailers with a mix of supply sources, including: groundwater from critically over drafted and adjudicated basins; surface water from the State Water Project, Central Valley Project, Colorado River, and local sources; and recycled water.

The UWMPs are required to include a WSCP, a document to be engaged in the case of a water shortage event, such as a drought or supply interruption, and define specific policies and actions that will be implemented at various shortage level scenarios. For example, implementing customer water budgets and surcharges, or restricting landscape irrigation. Agencies in California commonly face water supply reliability issues and, at the same time, demand hardening, creating a significant challenge. EKI addresses these issues through a rigorous quantitative assessment of water use for potential water savings using EKI’s Drought Response Tool (DRT). The DRT is a user-friendly model that was used to support the development of 80+ agencies statewide.

EKI supports private developers across California in developing and providing peer reviews of SB-610-compliant WSAs. The WSAs estimate projected project and system demands and supply reliability for both new developments and water systems. EKI has demonstrated our ability to support clients with more than just WSA preparation. We have also raised key strategic and policy issues in a timely manner. We successfully completed numerous robust WSAs for clients in Southern California, the Central Valley, Bay Area, and Central Coast.