What's it going to take to get people to use a lot less water in drought-stricken California, the Technicolour landscape of lush yards, emerald golf courses and aquamarine swimming pools?
Residents may be about to find out as California imposes the first mandatory statewide water-use restrictions later in 2015.
Governor Jerry Brown has ordered a 25 per cent overall cutback in water use by cities and towns, but not farms, in the most sweeping drought measures ever undertaken by the US' most populous state.
The crackdown comes as California and its nearly 40 million residents move toward a fourth summer of drought with no relief in sight. State reservoirs have a year's worth of water, and with record low snowfall over the winter there won't be much to replenish them. Wells in some parts of the state are going dry as groundwater levels fall.
Brown's tough on water use move came after his push for voluntary conservation yielded mixed results. Asked by Brown in January 2014 to cut their water consumption by 20 per cent, Californians achieved only about half that.
State water officials will now draw up the emergency regulations to carry out the governor's order and hope to have them ready for enactment in May, said George Kostyrko, spokesman for the state Water Resources Control Board.
The governor's order requires the roughly 400 water agencies around the state to cut water use by one-quarter from the 2013 level.
Homeowners will get rebates for replacing lawns with greenery more suited to the semi-arid state and for installing more water-thrifty appliances and plumbing fixtures. The state also will press water agencies to impose higher, graduated rates to discourage water guzzling.
Cemeteries, golf courses and business headquarters must cut back significantly on watering the grass and shrubs. And new homes will not be allowed to use drinking water for irrigation unless they have water-stingy drip systems.
Homeowners and water districts that violate the rules will be subject to fines, but many of the enforcement details have yet to be worked out.
Farmers have already done their part, fallowing land and paying more for water, said Shawn Stevenson, a farmer in California's agricultural heartland, the Central Valley.
Stevenon said he had to rip out nearly half his almond, pistachio and citrus trees.
"It's nice to know that some of our fellow state residents are going to share in the pain," he said. "Why they didn't do it last year, I don't know."
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