When compared with urban water efficiency, the water storage projects that would be half-funded by the November water bond have very high per-project costs, low yield, and immensely high costs per acre-foot of water. Increasing urban water efficiency only costs about $112 per acre-foot while raising Shasta dam is over $23,000 per acre-foot and building Sites reservoir is almost $6,000 an acre-foot. (An acre-foot is 325,851 gallons of water, enough to last two average California households a year for outdoor and indoor uses.)

Sources for AquAlliance’s Bar Graph: Shasta: Bureau of Reclamation, Plan Formulation Appendices, 2013; Temperance Flat: DWR, Temperance Flat Reservoir FAQ, 2007; Sites: DWR, Sites Reservoir FAQ, 2007; Urban Water Efficiency: CalFed Bay Delta Program, Water Use Efficiency Element, 2006 (pp. 126, 130)