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more waterSubmitted by Susan Miller on Fri, 07/20/2007 - 16:28.
Submitted by Susan Miller on July 20, 2007 - 2:56pm.
This week the National Association of Clean Water Agencies (NACWA) had their annual conference in Cleveland at the Renaissance Hotel. The Keynote address was given by Congressman Sherwood Boehlert, nicknamed the “Green Hornet” during his years in Congress. Boehlert is best known for his work on environmental policy. Beginning in the 1980's with the acid rain crisis, Boehlert became a prominent voice in the Republican Party for the environment. He was a major contributor to the acid rain provisions of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. In his opening remarks he said that “green” is the new red white and blue. Highlights included speakers from water, sewer and stormwater utilities from around the nation as well as professionals who study and innovate in the field of water and its affiliated green infrastructures. Dr. Chris Crockett, the “Stream Doctor” from Philadelphia told the story of clean water in Philly including building the gray infrastructure, but more interestingly the green infrastructure. He spoke about permeable pavement (begun in Philly in 1999) in new places like basketball courts in central city neighborhoods – these are particularly loved by the kids because they don’t flood and the kids can play even while it’s raining – they’re cooler, quieter, and it’s quicker to game time after the rain. The permeable asphalt is being laid down throughout Philly; even PDOT is using it. Why? It freezes less often and requires less salting, all that in addition to how well it drains to allow stormwater to infiltrate rather than run to a pipe. How do they make permeable asphalt? They shut down the plant and remove the sand – the other ingredients without the sand make it permeable – in fact in Georgia they are using permeable concrete for road building. So why aren’t we using it here?
They studied the surfaces in Philly and found that half of them were public and half private. The public (government funded and controlled public rights of way) can lead in stormwater innovation, but businesses are more flexible and can adapt more quickly to new technologies. In many cities, the transition from a sewer district to a stormwater utility means that rates go up for the buildings that have large areas of impervious surface and down for the smaller footprint downtown vertical buildings – this would seem to drive development to a denser more concentrated land use and into the empty buildings in the central city rather than out to the beltway, where public transit cannot bring workers – making large paved areas for parking necessary; obviously this has an impact on air quality too. Here’s a study by the National Resources Defense Council that looked at this issue in Cleveland. Dr. Crockett showed slides of a stream bank restoration project that resembles what we need to do at the Doan Brook in Rockefeller Park. He said that the stream has seen the return of fish and bugs, a result that could have taken numerous steps had they not restored the riparian buffers to the stream and slowed the water flow that scours the waterway. He reminded us that 20 years is not long enough to resolve problems that have been 200 years in the making. But we need to restore urban streams to a state that resembles their state before the pipes were there. He suggested that water quality professionals need to think like fish, to ask themselves “What does swim-able mean?” In Philly they have real-time water quality data for people who want to swim or boat or otherwise recreate in the river. Best Management Practices BMPs and Best Available Technology Economically Achievable BATs are the plug and play solutions, so he urged professionals to think more broadly. He and many others spoke about the benefit of green infrastructure; that CSO and stream or lake improvement money spent can, should and will show other benefits in air quality, heat island reduction, crime reduction and education. Then we heard Steve Wise from the Center for Neighborhood Technology. He noted that green infrastructure is being studied and implemented in many cities with whom they’re working, but pointed out specifically the excitement about these ideas in Chicago. As an example, the city offered $5,000 grants for green roof assistance – they got 100 applications on the first round! The presenters talked about the need to review and change local ordinances to incentivize green infrastructure. Though green infrastructure cannot close the huge gap in our water quality management issue, we saw great examples like the one above with the basketball courts that should be considered here in our region. Due to the compartmentalization of the efforts of soil and water conservation districts, sewer districts, water departments, city arborists, transportation planners, parks and recreation directors and urban planners, who must all meet their mandates and abide by their own separate regulatory structures, the efforts to incorporate green infrastructure are thwarted by the very government that regulates, divides and funds it. In other words, rather than a bridal gown, this environmental bride (our ecosystem) is sporting separates. There are wonderful synergies in the projects completed by these stormwater utilities such as the increase in property values, dryer basements, quieter, safer streets never mind safer water. There can be a cost reduction for gray infrastructure when green infrastructure is added to the mix. However some of these green infrastructure programs are not simple to implement despite how obvious they seem. Changing local ordinances is perhaps the biggest obstacle in addition to the fact that there is not a unified approach and in our region risk taking even when ideas are proven over many years in other communities is at the ebb, not the flow. These ideas for green infrastructure go beyond downspout disconnects, rain barrels and rain gardens. They include:
All these things lead to one big question for our region; when will the NEORSD stop being a sewer district and become a storm water utility?
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NEORSD
You're right Susan--we all need to consider storm water and it's impact and waste in our communities. NEORSD is doing that in the West Creek watershed. You will see more of this type of storm water management. Unfortunately, we send our problems to the NEORSD and ask them to fix it. Ditto for the City of Cleveland water department. We are extremely lucky citizens to have conscientious employees at these two agencies that quietly do their job to keep us alive. They can't slack at their jobs. Maybe, some of the top dogs slack, but the ground troops don't. We have to point the fingers at ourselves. Our complacent lifestyles waste water and our decisions about where to live, far from everyone else, destroy the land needed to promote groundwater recharge. We are all sinners. I can't say that I will be redeemed, but I am going to explore the option of saving my grey water in a tank for reuse. We can all try a little harder. The retrofit options are expensive. Regreening the City is the most logical fast fix. The soils in Cuyahoga County want to revert to Forest. We have to let it happen in as many strategic areas as possible. It will also help us breathe easier.
One Small Step: From Sink to Sunflowers
November/December 2007
"I WAS LIVING IN A BIG HOME with seven other people, and we were starting to garden. My housemate Cleo and I realized that our household was using an incredible amount of water. The average American uses 50 to 70 gallons of water per day, just inside the home. If you include the yard and lawn, it's almost double. It seems crazy how much we waste.
"So I wondered if there was a way to reuse our sink water to irrigate. Through trial and error, we figured out how to create a gray-water system, which means taking the water from your sinks, showers, or washing machine and directing it into your yard. I took a plumbing class, and we set up a little wetland in a bathtub in the yard to filter the water. We were able to cut our water use in half.
"Some people have the misconception that gray-water systems are dangerous or unhealthy, but there has never been a documented case of anyone getting sick from them, as long as you don't drink the water or spray it on food crops that will be eaten raw. They're easy to set up and only cost around $100 for a basic system, not including labor.
"After we installed our system, lots of people asked questions about it, so we self-published a magazine and distributed it to people who wanted to learn how to set up their own. It started spreading around the country, and we got letters from as far away as Australia. We took on the name Greywater Guerrillas and wrote a book about it. Now we're touring the country helping folks with installations. People tell us that they find taking control of their water system really empowering. And it forces you to be a better steward—you don't want to pour toxic products down the drain if they're going right into your vegetable garden." —interview by Orli Cotel
GOT WATER? Between 1950 and 2000, the U.S. population grew by almost 90 percent, while water use swelled by 209 percent. At least 36 states expect local, regional, or statewide water shortages by 2013, according to the EPA.
ON THE WEB Find out more about water efficiency at epa.gov/watersense. To learn how to build your own gray-water-filtering system, visit greywaterguerrillas.com or greywater.net.
From:http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200711/one_small_step.asp
Great notes on water management
I didn't even know this conference was taking place - thanks for posting such excellent notes. At our house in East Cleveland we will have rain barrels and divert downspouts and will put in a very cool green roof garden (wish we had grants for that here). I also need to replace the driveway and walks and want to look into replacing concrete and sandstone with gravel to be more permeable. I'll certainly recommend that East Cleveland look at implementing as many of the program you highlight above as is possible.
Disrupt IT
Much of U.S. Could See a Water Shortage
Oct 26, 2:27 PM (ET)
By BRIAN SKOLOFF