The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (Met) is the largest supplier of drinking water in the United States, supplying more than 18 million customers. I just returned a few days ago from meetings with the General Manager of Met and staff. My employer, the American Water Resources Association (AWRA), is planning a meeting in Los Angeles (LA) in 2015 on the subject of water for large urban areas. The visit corresponded with a seminal event in the history of LA water supplies, the impetus for this month's column.

Met would not be supplying that many customers nor would LA be a mega city if it were not for the foresight of a water resources engineer, William Mulholland, who more than 100 years ago realized the LA basin could not support a larger population without importing water. His brainchild, the Los Angeles Aqueduct that brought the needed water to LA, was 100 years old in November.

Begun in 1908, the original aqueduct received water diverted from the Owens River in Inyo County in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It was completed in 1913 under budget at a total cost of $26 million. During the five years of construction a total of 5000 workers were involved. The more than 230 mile long system of storage reservoirs and canals brings the diverted water to a reservoir north of LA.

The project was controversial from the beginning. In the early 1900's, agents from the city of Los Angeles went to the Owens Valley which, because of abundant water, supported an agricultural economy. The agents purchased land and water rights from many of the farmers in the Owens Valley in some cases through subterfuge that eventually led to serious discord. In the 1920s, a bombing by some residents damaged the upper end of the aqueduct. If you've seen the movie, Chinatown, you know a little about the controversy.

The project was a boon to the LA area. Originally depending on water from small creeks and rivers in the LA basin that sometimes ran dry, the promise of abundant water allowed the city to grow from 61 square miles in 1909 to 440 in 1929 to 503 today.

Still, there was opposition and resentment. A second aqueduct from the Owens Valley, completed in 1970, dried up the river, led to dewatering of shallow groundwater and essentially turned some of the valley into a dust bowl. Lawsuits against LA ensued and finally in 1997, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed in which LA promised to re-water the Lower Owens Valley. This finally happened in 2008, five years later than the date specified in the MOU.

Is there a happy ending? I guess so. As of 2012, Los Angeles has a population of 3.9 million. The city has plenty of water and is one of the better cities in the United States for conserving water. However, as the population continues to increase, Met continues to look for additional water supplies.

What about the Owens Valley? Inyo County has a population of 17,000. Happily, thanks to the investment of more than one billion by Los Angeles in Inyo County to restore flows in the lower Owens River, fish, birds, and other flora and fauna have returned to what for many years had become a dust bowl.

Sadly, it took nearly 100 years.