San Diego turns to ocean for fresh water

SAN DIEGO, June 7 (UPI) -- San Diego County hopes to get 20 percent of its tap water from the ocean by 2020, which would make it the world leader in desalination, officials said.

The county water authority is contemplating construction of a desalination plant at Camp Pendleton, Calif., that could produce 150 million gallons a day, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported Sunday. Poseidon Resources plans a plant in Carlsbad that could produce 50 million gallons daily by 2012.

The largest such plant now in existence or under construction is in Algeria. That plant, scheduled for completion in 2011, would produce 132 million gallons daily.

San Diego County is also involved in discussions with the International Boundary and Water Commission on building a plant in Mexico 15 miles south of the border.

The county currently gets 90 percent of its water from the Colorado River and from Northern California. San Diego cannot expect supplies from either to increase.

"The fact that there's no large groundwater basin limits our opportunities," said Ken Weinberg, the authority's director of water resources. "We have very limited sources -- you have recycling, you have conservation and you've got the ocean."