The answer to the question of whether Los Angeles will run out of water is a resounding yes, according to Jay Famiglietti, NASA's senior water scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Data collected since 2002, when satellite monitoring began, shows that California's total water storage has been steadily declining, with 26% of groundwater being depleted since the start of the 20th century. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Energy (LADWE) reported that Angelenos filed 1,198 water waste reports in May, a significant increase from the 544 reports made in the same month last year. In response to the intensifying drought, state water regulators voted to enact an emergency order banning thousands of Californians, mainly farmers, from using water from rivers and streams.
In order to comply with the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) order, dozens of water agencies, including LADWE, reduced residents to outdoor irrigation one or two days a week on June 1.The latest figures indicate that the message is slowly getting through, with the South Coast hydrological region - home to Los Angeles - seeing savings of 2.2% in May.
