In a major stride toward water sustainability, the Regional Water Authority (RWA) has announced that Sacramento-area water providers banked 35,231 acre-feet — nearly 11.5 billion gallons — of water in the Sacramento Regional Water Bank during 2024. This reserve could supply approximately 105,700 households for a year.
The Water Bank is a vital network of wells, pumps, and pipelines that allows local agencies to store surplus surface water in underground aquifers. These aquifers are key to adapting the region’s water system to climate change impacts, including shrinking snowpack and more frequent droughts and floods.
“Once again, water banking has proven to be an effective solution for storing water that will be available when it’s needed most,” said Jim Peifer, RWA Executive Director. “In a year with near-average conditions in the American River watershed, local water providers were still able to bank a significant amount of water to support both our communities and the environment during dry periods.”
All 2024 deposits were made through in-lieu recharge, a strategy that involves using surface water instead of groundwater for customer supply, allowing aquifers to naturally replenish. The City of Sacramento, Sacramento Suburban Water District, Carmichael Water District, California American Water, and Sacramento County Water Agency were key participants.
“These actions represent a powerful tool for us to store water during good years to protect against shortages in dry periods ahead,” said Brett Ewart, RWA Board Chair and Supervising Engineer with the City of Sacramento. “We’re giving the same level of focus to managing surface water when it’s plentiful as we do to managing groundwater during times of scarcity.”
For more than two decades, Sacramento-area water providers have implemented both in-lieu recharge and Aquifer Storage and Recovery (ASR), a method where water is actively injected into underground aquifers through wells and retrieved when needed. These combined approaches have helped maintain sustainable groundwater levels and increased regional water resilience.
Looking ahead, efforts are underway to expand the Water Bank’s storage capacity. Current plans aim to boost storage to 65,000 acre-feet during wet years. Long-term projects could further increase capacity to as much as 90,000 acre-feet annually — enough to supply around 270,000 households per year. These expansions are part of a broader strategy to future-proof the region's water system and ensure reliability amid increasing climate volatility.
