San Francisco starts 'big fix' for Hetch Hetchy water system that serves 2.4 million San Francisco starts 'big fix' for Hetch Hetchy water system that serves 2.4 million (January 11, 2006)

** Can they finish the $4.3 billion project by 2015?

By Marion Softky

Almanac Staff Writer

Let's pray we don't have a major earthquake before 2015 -- or whenever San Francisco finishes rebuilding the deteriorating and seismically vulnerable water system on which 2.4 million people in four counties depend.

Three years after San Francisco voters passed a bond issue to pay for the city's share of fixing the water system, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission officially approved and launched its $4.3 billion water system improvement program at a public hearing November 29.

"Now we intend to hold ourselves and our consultants accountable for delivering this program," said Susan Leal, the commission's general manager.

The challenge is huge. The program consists of some 75 individual projects to fix the aging system of reservoirs, pipes, pumps, tunnels and treatment facilities. These carry 265 million gallons of water per day from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park some 160 miles, across five earthquake faults, to homes and businesses in the Bay Area, where people depend on the San Francisco system for 85 percent of their water.

Until these projects are completed, the system, much of which was built 80 or more years ago, remains vulnerable. A 2002 study warned a major earthquake could leave the Bay Area without mountain water for up to 60 days.

One of the major challenges will be for the San Francisco commission to manage such a big program. During the past year, the commission has refined the program, initiated environmental review through the San Francisco Planning Department, and hired consultants to review the program and management of the projects. It has hired new staff and put new management procedures in place.

Nevertheless, many people still wonder if the commission can deliver the program on time and on budget.

"That's our worry," said Art Jensen, general manager of the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, which represents the 28 water agencies in San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Alameda counties that buy water wholesale from San Francisco. "We don't think they can get the job done with the capability they have today."

These 28 agencies, including California Water Service Co. and the Menlo Park Water Department, use two-thirds of the water that San Francisco delivers, and will pay two-thirds of the cost of rebuilding the system.

The schedule and budget have already slipped by three years and $700 million. When San Francisco voters passed a $1.6 billion bond issue in 2002 for their share of the project, the total cost was estimated at $3.6 billion -- $700 million less than the current estimate.

Echoing Mr. Jensen's concerns, Palo Alto Mayor Bern Beecham, chair of the Bay Area water agency board, warned that the program would be spending $75 million a month for four years before completion, and $200 million a month for the final five months. There are "serious doubts whether the schedule is achievable," he said.
What next?

Local residents will not observe much action over the next few years as San Francisco designs the projects and conducts the environmental reviews.

The major local impact then will be the addition of a 60-inch pipe along the right-of-way that slashes across Menlo Park and Redwood City between the Bay and the Pulgas Water Temple, where Hetch Hetchy water enters Crystal Springs Reservoir.

And as construction ramps up, so will water bills to pay for it. "Water rates will go up by a factor of 2 to 3 between now and 2015," Mr. Jensen said.

Over the next couple of years, if the schedule holds, the 75-plus projects will be fully designed while the environmental impact reports are being prepared and debated.

"In the next 18 months you'll be having more meetings and more updates as we find out more about the impacts of specific projects," said Maureen Barry, spokesperson for the SFPUC. Ms. Barry hopes that major Peninsula projects will be complete by 2012. Besides the new Bay pipeline, these include modifying the Crystal Springs dam, and replacing the 4,000-foot Crystal Springs bypass tunnel near Polhemus Road in San Mateo. This tunnel traverses unstable land and was threatened by a landslide in the El Nino storms of 1998.

The Crystal Springs dam needs to be raised and the spillway widened to meet new requirements of the state Division of Dam Safety for catastrophic floods, Ms. Barry said. This project will bring the dam back to its original capacity, since the water level has been lowered for several years, she explained.

One Peninsula project has already been completed, Ms. Barry said. Repair of the Pulgas balancing reservoir was recently completed 66 days ahead of schedule.
Long-term issues

Two long-term issues promise to keep the debate lively over the next few years: The question of how much additional water is needed to serve regional growth, and where it will come from; and the proposal to drain the Hetch Hetchy reservoir and restore the valley that John Muir treasured a century ago.

The water system improvement program is designed to provide water to meet regional demands of 330 million gallons per day through 2030 -- up from the 265 million it delivers today.

The debate centers on whether extra water can be obtained from conservation, recycling, groundwater and desalination, or whether more water will be needed from the Tuolomne River. The water system improvement program includes conservation projects and $100 million for a desalination plant.

The issue of restoring Hetch Hetchy Valley by draining the reservoir will re-ignite when the state issues a report on the feasibility of the project early this year.

While San Francisco and the Bay Area water agency have not openly opposed restoration of Hetch Hetchy, they want to be sure it does not derail fixing the water system essential to the health and safety of people and businesses in four counties.

"[They] have made it clear that nothing should interfere with rebuilding the system," Mr. Jensen said.
INFORMATION

Public outreach will start this spring for a separate environmental impact report for Bay Division Pipeline No. 5, which upgrades and expands the pipe system that crosses San Francisco Bay south of the Dumbarton Bridge. New pipe will go under the Bay between Newark and Ravenswood and be added along the right-of-way through Menlo Park and Redwood City to the Pulgas Tunnel Portal. For information, go online to sfwater.org; or call Betsy Rhodes at 415-554-3240, or e-mail her at blauppe@sfwater.org.

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