Grass to Xeriscape Conversions Bring Big Water Savings for Mesa in 2024

Grass-to-Xeriscape Conversions Bring Big Water Savings for Mesa in 2024

Mesa businesses, homeowners associations (HOAs) and residential customers removed approximately 330,000 square feet of turf in 2024 thanks to the City's Grass-to-Xeriscape incentives. These incentives help customers alleviate the cost of removing grass and replacing it with a low-water-use landscape.

A large part of the programs success in 2024 can be attributed to the non-residential program. Mesa received $710,000 in grant funding from the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona (WIFA) to assist non-residential customers with landscape conversions. The program proved extremely popular, with more than $500,000 of the grant funding committed in just 10 months by 17 customers with an average incentive of $33,000. Mesas sustainability and water conservation teams presented the findings during todays council study session.

The results of Mesas non-residential grass removal projects are significant for long-term water savings: 282,000 square feet of grass will be removed and replaced with low-water-use plants.An estimated annual water savings of 7 million gallons or 22 acre-feet.An anticipated 5-year cumulative savings of 105 million gallons or 322 acre-feet.For reference, one acre-foot of water can supply three or more homes with potable water for one year, depending on the household usage.
The non-residential water conservation program also includes incentives for irrigation equipment upgrades such as smart controllers, flow sensors or pressure regulators. The irrigation projects completed in 2024 are projected to save more than 13 million gallons per year (or 41 acre-feet).

In addition to the non-residential program, Mesa also offers incentives to homeowners for future grass removal projects. Since the program's inception in 2007, more than 600 homes have completed their conversions and removed 575,000 square feet of grass. This resulted in an estimated cumulative savings of 142 million gallons of water (or 435 acre-feet). In 2019, a tree bonus was added to enhance the program, and 230 trees have been planted, supporting the City's Trees Are Cool Initiative and goal of planting 1,000,000 trees by 2050.

For additional information about Mesas incentive programs, visit mesaaz.gov/conservation.