Aquifer recharge.

Existing law requires the Natural Resources Agency to update every 3 years the state's climate adaptation strategy, known as the Safeguarding California Plan, and to coordinate with other state agencies to identify vulnerabilities to climate change by sectors and priority actions needed to reduce the risks in those sectors. Existing law requires, to address the vulnerabilities identified in the plan, state agencies to maximize specified objectives, including promoting the use of the plan to inform planning decisions and ensure that state investments consider climate change impacts, as well as promote the use of natural systems and natural infrastructure, when developing physical infrastructure to address adaptation. This bill would add aquifers as part of the meaning of natural infrastructure. Existing law establishes the Department of Water Resources in the Natural Resources Agency. Existing law authorizes the department to investigate any natural situation available for reservoirs or reservoir systems for gathering and distributing flood or other water not under beneficial use in any stream, stream system, lake, or other body of water. Existing law also authorizes the department to ascertain the feasibility of projects for those reservoirs or reservoir systems, the supply of water that may thereby be made available, and the extent and character of the areas that may be thereby irrigated, as well as the cost of those projects. The bill would require the department to prepare and produce a report to the Legislature, by July 1, 2024, outlining best practices for aquifer recharge. The bill would require the report to include specified information, including, among other things, guidelines for a streamlined permitting process for aquifer recharge projects that implement the best practices outlined in the report. The bill would also require the department to create a grant program by July 1, 2025, to implement best practices in aquifer recharge, including a streamlined process for the issuance of grant funds.