Laserfiche WebLink
<br /> <br />whose sole purpose is to enforce watering restrictions.4 After encouraging discretionary <br />water conservation, Denver's water department imposed mandatory water restrictions. <br /> <br />How did we get here? Two causes are obvious: several dry years in a row and robust <br />population growth, especially along Colorado's Front Range. Another cause is not so <br />obvious: inefficient water use. <br /> <br />We waste water. We pour it on bluegrass and other foliage that cannot live here naturally <br />because of aridity. 5 We use more water than is needed for a wide range of indoor uses, <br />from toilets to dishwashers to showers. We lose a lot of water in municipal water supply <br />systems. We fail to re-use water when we can, after it has been used once. We fail to <br />take maximum advantage of opportunities to use surface and groundwater conjunctively, <br />storing surplus surface supplies in wet years in aquifers for retrieval in dry years. Our <br />water providers do not always coordinate their water supply programs with each other, <br />resulting in duplication offacilities and plans.6 And, discouraged by our state's outdated <br />"use it or lose it" dogma, our cities don't work enough with farmers and ranchers to <br />increase irrigation water use efficiency, where a portion of water salvaged could flow to <br />the cities. In short, we still act as if water were not the valuable resource that it is in this <br />arid place we call home. <br /> <br />Water usage figures, stated in gross gallons per capita per day (GPCD), while not a <br />perfect measure of an area's conservation water use efficiency, suggest that along the <br />Front Range we can do much more to stretch our water resources. For example, water <br />use in the Denver metro area is well over 200 gallons per capita per day.7 Residents in <br />Tucson, Arizona, use roughly 160 GPCD.8 San Antonio, Texas, used 143 GPCD in the <br />year 2001 and is shooting for 140 GPCD in 2008 and 132 GPCD in 2015.9 Santa Fe, <br />New Mexico, and El Paso, Texas, are also under 160 GPCD and shooting for lower <br />targets. 10 Experiences from these other western cities reveal that we can live and prosper <br />in the Southwest using less water than we do now. <br /> <br />Moving Forward: <br /> <br />Water conservation is a key to enhancing our water use efficiency. At the core of water <br />conservation are rate structures that communicate the full cost of incremental supplies of <br />water, thereby encouraging water users to use less water in light of the cost of the water <br />supplies saved. Inclining block or inverted rate structures are a good way of encouraging <br />cost-based conservation of water. <br /> <br />4 Daily Camera (June 6, 2002) <br />5 Some communities proudly display thekhealthy bluegrass lawns, while others are actually required by <br />covenant to plant and maintain bluegrass turf in front and back yards. <br />6 See Hydrosphere et. at., Metropolitan Water Snpply Investigation (MWSI), 1999. <br />7 Maddeus et. at. "Qualitative Review of Water COllServation Program (May 2001 at 2-6. <br />8 Craig O'Hare, "City of Santa Fe Per Capita Water Demands: Comparison with Other Cities," August 27, <br />2001. <br />9 http://www.saws.org <br />10 http://www.epwu.org <br /> <br />2 <br />