Law Commons^™

The Reasonable Use Doctrine In California Water Law And Policy, Brian E. Gray

Faculty Scholarship

The cardinal principle of California water law is that all water rights, and all uses of water, must be reasonable. This seemingly simple and innocuous sentence masks a world of meaning and complexity, however, because the requirement of reasonable use embraces at least four interrelated concepts. The determination of reasonable water use is utilitarian: the law seeks to encourage relatively efficient, economically and socially beneficial uses of the state’s water resources. It is situational: the evaluation of individual reasonable use concerns not only the water right holder’s own uses but also other competing demands (both consumptive and ecological) on the …