How community-level water rights shape household water affordability in California

Keywords: Water rights, drinking water, environmental justice, water justice, affordability, California
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Monday
Session Start / End Time: 2/28/2022 03:40 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/28/2022 05:00 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 57

Abstract

Despite California’s legal recognition of the human right to water (AB 685) in 2012, persistent socioeconomic inequities shape drinking water affordability at the household level. Though rarely interrogated in relation to domestic water access, the state’s water rights regime structures water system sourcing by delimiting which community water systems have access to groundwater and surface water supplies. If a water system’s demand exceeds its allocation per the water rights system, then the water system has to purchase water. The relationship between community-level water purchasing and household water affordability deserves investigation given the costs associated with purchasing water from wholesalers. I leverage publicly available statewide datasets to examine how California’s water rights regime shapes drinking water affordability at the household level. Specifically, I use multivariate analysis techniques to assess whether community water systems that purchase water have higher household basic needs water costs. For low-income households, high basic needs water costs can render water unaffordable, challenging a key pillar of the human right to water. Results of this study inform community and policy efforts to implement the human right to water and provide an initial basis to evaluate how water rights structure household water affordability.