In 1988, Metropolitan and the Imperial Irrigation District launched an innovative partnership that not only improves water supply reliability for urban Southern California, but shores up a leaky irrigation system in the Imperial Valley.

The IID/MWD Water Conservation Program is simple in concept. Metropolitan paid the cost of improving Imperial’s distribution system, including such measures as concrete lining earthen canals, constructing local reservoirs and spill-interceptor canals, installing non-leak gates, automating the distribution system, and altering water delivery timetables, the cost of on-farm conservation measures consisting of tailwater pumpback, drip irrigation and linear move irrigation systems.

And for Metropolitan, funding those conservation measures means an additional 101,940 acre-feet of water each year for at least 42 more years through 2047.

The 2003 Quantification Settlement Agreement modified this program to a degree. 20,000 acre-feet of conserved water under the program are made available to Coachella Valley Water District every year.