Responsible Management Today

Sustainable groundwater supply for the future

Groundwater Allocation & Monitoring

Over the last two and a half years, Merced Irrigation-Urban GSA has been working diligently through a stakeholder-guided process to lay the foundation for effective groundwater management within the Agency’s boundary area to address SGMA-defined “undesirable results”. MIUGSA has been developing the rules, regulations, and policies to implement a program to prevent declining groundwater levels, subsidence, and other sustainability indicators identified in the Merced Groundwater Sustainability Plan. Program implementation includes allocating, measuring, monitoring, and enforcing groundwater extraction and use.

* All users of groundwater are subject to comply with measures set by the GSAs to comply with SGMA. Note that SGMA does not allow metering of wells that extract 2-acre feet (650,000 gallons) or less per year for domestic purposes such as one-acre residential lots. 

The timeline highlights the key milestones since the inception of SGMA through phase one (2023-2025) of MIUGSA’s implementation of the Merced GSP within its boundaries.

  • The MIUGSA Board set a groundwater allocation of 3.3-acre feet per acre over three years (1.1-acre foot per year on average) starting April 1, 2023 through December 31, 2025 and will require that all agriculture wells be registered.

    MIUGSA is incorporating flexibility and tools into the rules and policies that will allow agricultural users to comply with the allocation. These include combining allocated water over multiple parcels, allow carry-over of recharged water and any unused water to future years, and accounting for supplemental groundwater from an Ag user’s water provider.

  • MIUGSA has developed a platform (Groundwater Accounting Platform) to help landowners and growers comply with MIUGSA’s groundwater allocation, as a result of California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.

    The Groundwater Accounting Platform is located at www.groundwateraccounting.org/miugsa.

    Please contact MIUGSA staff at contact@miugsa.org or at (209) 677-7462 if you would like assistance accessing the platform.

  • MIUGSA has prepared an example Groundwater Account Statement for growers and landowners to review. The example Groundwater Account Statement defines terms found throughout the document.

    Example Groundwater Account Statement

  • The MIUGSA Board adopted penalties for the overextraction of groundwater. Penalties for overextraction would not be imposed until the year 2025.

    Penalties that may have accrued during the Allocation Period would be applied retroactively. Otherwise stated, penalties are based on the entire allocation period, including the time prior to 2025.

    Penalties are as follows:

    • <1.1 AF/AC over groundwater account’s total water availability during the Allocation Period: $200/AF

    • >1.1 AF/AC over groundwater account’s total water availability during the Allocation Period: $500/AF

  • Fortunately, most agricultural users within MIUGSA boundaries are also customers of the Merced Irrigation District (MID) and are typically less dependent on groundwater to meet the watering needs of crops. Agricultural users may acquire surface water or developed water supplies (water that MID recharges into the groundwater basin) from MID. MIUGSA will account for different water sources (allocated groundwater, surface water, and developed water) in the Ag user’s water budget to help Ag users remain compliant with groundwater extraction.

    MIUGSA encourages growers, especially those reliant on groundwater, to contact MID to discuss potential options if the groundwater allocation is not sufficient.

    *Note: MIUGSA is a Groundwater Sustainability Agency and is not a part of MID, however, most groundwater users (agriculture) are MID customers.

  • The MIUGSA Board adopted flow meter requirements and installation timelines, which can be viewed here:

    Flow Meter Requirements

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