What does your water cost?
What is it costing you today and what might it cost you in 5 years?
What if there is a continuing drought? But what if our major sources of surface water (Bay Delta Complex) is cut off by an earthquake or other known threats for 1-3 years?
Disaster workers understand that people can survive without drinking water for about a week.
So we can easily understand the importance of the supply of clean drinking water and the relevance of the water distribution-supply chain. Costs that we pay as consumers depend upon the costs and markup by organizations between our homes and the ultimate sources.
R4RD has discovered that water costs are mysterious, especially in context of Desalinated water costs predicted or reported. Water planners talk in terms of Acre Feet or Million Gallons or similar terms. We have a conversion spreadsheet available for those interested: see Water_Energy_Conversions
The range of wholesale water per acre foot is from $237 to over $3,000.
See the references (TBD)
While this sounds like a simple question, it may be difficult to really answer the full question. You can easily get an answer by buying bottled water at Ralph’s or Albertsons. (But you will be paying an outrageous markup over your own tap water brought to you by the City of Huntington Beach or other water retailer)
Think about your personal Water Bill that you receive in your mail box. You pay for your water in units called ” a billing unit” which is 748 Gallons.
Please look at your last month’s Municipal Services Statement. It includes your Water, Sewer, and Refuse Charges. Your water charges may be only half of the total after fees are deducted. My statement showed 9 units consumed or about 6,732 gallons at a cost of $26.00 or a per gallon cost of $0.0039. What does your water cost a gallon?
And how is this fact related to Desal costs? HB pays for its water from two sources: surface and ground. As the supply of each decreases, and the demand increases, we can expect market prices to change from Source to Wholesale to Retail.