In McBroom’s blog, Greg Gartrell of the Contra Costa Water District suggests that in the event of seismically-induced levee breaches, water supplies might be compromised for three to four months by salt water intrusion before fresh water has a chance to flush the system.
In the meantime, some Californians could be using water stored in the 32 square mile Kern Water Bank, if the bank were being used as originally intended.
We’re always talking about the Kern Water Bank (KWB), so we thought we’d provide some facts from the Bank’s own FAQ page. Click here
The Bank has readily accessible storage for 1.5 million acre feet of water, enough to supply 12 million people for a year. That’s if the Bankers were keeping a reasonable level of deposits in the Bank instead of leveraging them to increase their own wealth.
You want to use a little skepticism as you get down toward the bottom of the KWB’s FAQs page. To the question, “Is the cost for the water that the Kern Water Bank recharges subsidized by taxpayers?” the answer is “No. Each participant pays for the water they deliver to the Kern Water Bank.”
The answer ignores the costs of taxpayer-subsidized infrastructure to develop the KWB in the first place and move the water south into it. And once the water is banked, the Bankers can turn around and sell it wherever they want for whatever profit they can get.