The Bay Area’s largest water agencies are working together to develop a regional solution to improve the water supply reliability for over 6 million area residents and the thousands of businesses and industries located therein. The Bay Area Regional Reliability (BARR) Partners include Alameda County Water District, Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, Contra Costa Water District, East Bay Municipal Utility District, Marin Municipal Water District, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, Santa Clara Valley Water District, and Zone 7 Water Agency. The BARR Partners have joined forces to leverage existing facilities and, if needed, build new ones to bolster regional water supply reliability.
The benefits of a regional approach include:
The BARR DCP, funded in part by a U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR) grant, serves as the first phase of the BARR project, The DCP differs from planning efforts in the past because it focuses on the Bay Area as a region as opposed to individual agencies, and it will integrate all of the required elements into one document. By taking a regional approach to drought contingency planning, the agencies will be able to enhance water supply reliability, leverage existing infrastructure investments, facilitate water transfers during critical shortages, improve climate change resiliency, and better meet the needs of the community and environment.