A billion dollars worth of water is in the pipeline and headed for the Bay Area in the form of two badly needed storage projects.

Water managers have been looking for a way to store more water without building new reservoirs like Anderson Dam in Morgan Hill. The solution, which is now being funded, is to expand a couple of existing reservoirs.

The California Water Commission is expected to approve committing a billion dollars to construct two large water projects in the Bay Area.

Approved by voters in 2014, the water bond issue proposition one has earmarked $485 million for the Santa Clara Valley Water District to essentially expand the existing Pacheco Reservoir near Pacheco Pass. A new 319-foot tall dam would expand the reservoir’s capacity from 6,000 acres to 140,000 acre-feet, enough water to supply 280,000 families of five for an entire year, says board chairman Richard Santos.

Also expected to win approval from the water commission is a $980 million expansion of the Los Vaqueros Reservoir in Contra Costa County. Its dam would be increased by 55 feet to 273 feet which would increase the reservoir’s storage capacity from 160,000 to 275,000 acre-feet.

Both of these projects are still years away and both will have to go through environmental reviews. But starting such a project from scratch would be virtually impossible nowadays, says chairman Santos.

By the way, the last dam built in Santa Clara County was Uvas Dam, near Gilroy, in 1957.  

Anderson Dam was built in 1950.

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