Viewpoints
California Coastal Commission must halt unjust, destructive Monterey desalination plant
As two mayors of color, we oppose a desalination project that would impose environmental injustice and economic racism on the people of Seaside and Marina in Monterey County.
The California Coastal Commission will vote on Thursday whether to approve a desalination plant being forced on the Monterey Peninsula by California American Water (Cal-Am).
The Monterey Peninsula does not want or need this oversized, overpriced groundwater desalination plant. We have a far more cost-effective solution for our future water needs in expanding our new recycled water project — Pure Water Monterey (PWM).
Marina and Seaside are predominantly minority and working-class communities on the Monterey Peninsula that struggling to survive in these challenging times. Many of Seaside and Marina’s residents live below the poverty line.
Cal-Am’s desalination plant would cause great financial and environmental harm to our communities. Its $1.2 billion price tag dwarfs the alternative $190 million cost for expanding our existing Pure Water Monterey recycled water plant. This is outrageous given that Cal-Am customers already have the highest water costs in the nation.
Initially, Cal-Am’s desalination plant was sold as a way to meet the state’s order to reduce our reliance on the Carmel River. But with PWM now operating and our community’s heroic job of conserving water, we have solved that problem. We are on track to meet the state’s cease and desist order by Dec. 2021 without desalination. And expanding our Pure Water Monterey recycled project would give us all the water we need for decades of growth.
Our concern is that aggressive political lobbying by the profit-seeking Cal-Am could lead to this desal project’s approval and devastation for our communities.
Environmentally, the plant would be a massive energy hog and help worsen climate change. It would emit 8,000 metric tons of CO2, making it the largest emitter of greenhouse gases on the Central Coast.
The desalination project’s extraction wells, electrical supply buildings and access roads, would dominate over 30 acres of Marina’s beautiful coastal sand dunes, which provide environmentally sensitive habitat to several species. Perimeter fences would prohibit access to our community’s beaches.
The desalination plants intake wells would draw water above two aquifers that provide all of Marina’s water supply, increasing the risk of extreme seawater intrusion. Marina cannot afford to lose its only source of water.
We agree with the Coastal Commission staff recommendation that this project should be denied, in part because there is a better solution to our water supply shortage that is affordable, socially just and environmentally responsible.
But this is where money and greed come in. Cal-Am cannot profit from expanding the Pure Water Monterey recycled water project, and stands to make over $100 million in profit from the desalination plant, according to estimates by the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District.
Cal-Am has employed an aggressive lobbying strategy and in a playbook reminiscent of the British Empire, tried to divide and conquer our region by promising subsidized desalinated water to some at the expense of others. Meanwhile they continue to repeat the lie that the desalination plant is the only solution to our future water needs.
We urge the Newsom Administration to see through this smokescreen and stand up for environmental and economic justice. We are honored to stand with over 25 local elected officials, including Assemblymember Mark Stone and state Senator Bill Monning, to oppose this desalination project.
Now we need the California Coastal Commission to say yes to recycled water and conservation and no to a greedy company bent on putting profit over people and our environment.
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