Water to Wine: Providing Los Carneros Vineyards with a New Irrigation Source

The Los Carneros Water District (LCWD) serves a large agricultural area comprised mostly of vineyards in Napa County, CA. For both potable and irrigation uses, the area relies on ground water, a source with fluctuating reliability and quality, especially given recent drought conditions. To make more groundwater available for potable use and provide a more consistent water supply to expand the area’s crop base, LCWD worked with the Napa Sanitation District to complete the design of an 8.6-mi. recycled water distribution system in December 2014. Construction was completed in March 2016. The new pipeline consists of 6- to 20-in. recycled water lines serving 107 connections (~4,300 acres of irrigable land) with 1,300 acre-feet of recycled water per year. An earthquake in August 2014 added a new challenge to the design as a previously inactive fault line caused surface rupture intercepting the pipe alignment in three locations. A system of bell-and-spigot and restrained joint piping was installed to meet design challenges associated with corrosive soils, fault zones, curved alignments, and restraint requirements.