The downside of water conservation

So it turns out there is a potential downside to buying that low flush toilet and letting your lawns fade to brown in the summer. The CRD water supply system in Victoria, BC is undergoing a budget shortfall this year as city water users have embraced water conservation. Yes, it's true - it appears that Victoria is just saving too much water! Victoria has actually been decreasing their water usage since 1998, even in light of significant population growth. Does this mean the message is getting across and people are really starting to embrace water awareness? I, for one, can only hope so! In one of the hotter, drier summers on record the water usage was actually below average. Only in June with the city under an all-time record breaking heat wave did it exceed the average water usage by 1.7%! Only 1.7%!

Victoria has instituted a number of the steps that we generally think are the "right things to do" such as requiring low flush toilets for new construction, water restrictions in the summer, promoting other water-saving appliances and lifestyles. While on the surface this unfortunately means likely modest rate increases for water usage, I find it hard to complain on this subject. We city water users already enjoy rates that are far less than what is reflective of the true price of delivering safe, reliable water to a municipality. This will come to bear when the true extent of the infrastructure upgrades that will be required are realized - so modest increases now are only a trend in the right direction.

So go on, keep those sprinklers to a minimum and keep using those low-flow showerheads. And enjoy the signs that the message is getting out there!

Are we all a little too thirsty?

A simple post this week, via Powerpoint presentation. Check it out here: http://www.watertiger.net/about/thirst.pps (will open in Powerpoint). It holds a few facts about water use in our world. I don't know who created this presentation, but would like to give credit if anyone out there can enlighten me.

Settlement Reached in Longstanding Water Dispute

For those keeping track of the longstanding water dispute between The Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation and Nestle, the case has finally been closed after reaching the Michigan Supreme Court. To quickly summarize the case: Nestle opened a bottling plant in 2002, using groundwater from the local watershed at up to 400 GPM to feed the bottling plant. The Conservation society sued Nestle, accusing them of damaging watersheds and local habitats by over-pumping as local water conditions were seen to change as a result.

The settlement reached this week allows Nestle to continue pumping and operating the plant, albeit at a slower rate (average of 218 GPM) with reduced rates in the summer months. This settlement effectively solidifies a temporary agreement that has been in place since 2006.

This is one of those disputes that some days you just don't expect to ever end. It has been the subject of much media attention and referenced in countless books and documentaries about the state of water in our world today. I imagine the Michigan Water Conservation Society will continue to closely monitor local water conditions to see no further damage is done by the continued, though reduced, pumping.

Opening a Can of Worms?

Wow, one headline really caught my eye this week: "Canada and US to Renegotiate Great Lakes Water Treaty." Of course, like most non-alarmist news articles, this one seemed to slip under the radar of most mainstream media outlets. Even the one source I saw it in barely gave it more than a few paragraphs, and half of that was off-topic on passport and free-trade issues. And while that in itself shows how important most people see this as, the rewriting of this treaty does have the potential for some pretty significant impact on water usage in the Great Lakes Basin, not to mention set a potentially powerful precedent for cross-border water negotiations in the future. To put you in the right frame of mind, here are a few tidbits to chew on*:

1) The Great Lakes Basin Watershed is the largest freshwater system on the planet
2) It contains an estimated 6 quadrillion gallons of freshwater. Or in other terms: about 1/5th of the world's freshwater, and 90-95% of the US supply.
3) The lakes have approx. 17,549km of shoreline. This is equal to 44% of the circumference of the Earth.
4) The population within the Great Lakes Basis is approx. 35 million people.
5) It is not only a major water source for those 35 million people, but is a critical economic pathway - a major transportation and shipping link.
6) Despite its size, it is a fragile ecosystem that needs to be protected, and hence this treaty NEEDS to be re-evaluated.

The original treaty has just celebrated its centennial, and so the issues that formed its inception have obviously matured. If you live in the region or have read any of the books on water related risks, or even seen the documentaries that reference issues in the region, you may be familiar with some of the stories that have come from the region. There is the story about the bottling company that has pumped so much water out of the watershed (and shipped the water away) that nearby wells and creeks have run dry. There is the story about tankers looking to fill directly from the lakes to ship the water to Asia for bottled markets there. There are stories about proposed pipelines to expand the distribution of the lake water - that 35 million people could grow drastically if this option takes hold.

Sitting here today, I don't know which players will be at the table renegotiating this treaty, but is it critical that the watershed management, the protection of both the quality and quantity of the water, be at the forefront. Should the discussion fall into a battle of who has more rights to the water, it will spell trouble for everyone involved, on both sides of the border, and both sides of the industry/consumer coin. The only way to maintain the interests of all involved is to maintain the integrity of the watershed itself. Watershed management in ANY watershed is a tough balancing act, but with the focus on such a massive cross-border area, the complexity is sure to skyrocket. I will be following the development of this with much interest. Now if only the media would do the same.

To see the article, in all of its brevity: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/06/13/boundary-waters.html. * Some facts taken from: http://www.great-lakes.net/

Are we behind the 8 ball in North America?

I've spent this week in Penticton, BC exhibiting at two industry tradeshows conveniently held back-to-back in the same convention hall: The Canadian Hospital Engineering Society (CHES) and the School Plant Officials Association (SPOA). Though we carry a very wide range of products that could conceivably make it onto our table for these two industries, we decided to focus on a growing problem in commercial and industrial buildings across North America including, but certainly not limited to, hospitals and schools. While it is by no means a new problem, it is one that is slowly coming to light - degrading mechanical systems.

It's no surprise that water-borne contaminants can wreck havoc in all kinds of circles, but often non-health related contamintants are ignored for the more immediate bacteria concerns. While no one stands to get sick from these problems, we do stand to spend an awful lot of money on fixing them! The most common example of this is particulate matter - dirt, rust, sand, sediment, silt (call it what you want), algae, etc. all have serious implications for the performance, or more appropriately, the failure of every piece of mechanical equipment you can think of. How well do you think pump seals, mixing valves, control valves, toilet tank valves, showerheads, automatic flush valves, etc. etc. etc. hold up to large loads of dirt? Easy answer - not very well!

It is incredible how much money is being spent on an annual basis, year after year after year, to just keep up with the failures that are seen from poor incoming water quality. And in North America, it seems to be accepted as normal practice. A common thought I hear is that "well, there's nothing we can do about the water the city gives us." Wrong! Well, sort of wrong. True, we can't change what comes in from the pipe to our building, but we can choose to deal with it before we pass that water throughout our entire distribution and plumbing network. What am I talking about? Simple filtration!

There are certain parts of the world where plumbing code strives to be more of a "best practice" rather than just the bare minimum, which seems to be the driving force in North America. For example, there exist inexpensive, easy to operate filtration systems (think of an automatic, self-cleaning strainer) that can be installed at the point-of-entry to commercial buildings that can handle flow rates up over 900 GPM to solve these problems.

Not even a month ago I was in a commercial building commissioning a system on a refridgeration loop. Turns out that from years of use, there was nearly a half bucket load of sand sitting in the pipes on the lower levels. Now this is the city of Vancouver, BC water supply - all in all an excellent water supply. However, we do tend to see high turbidity from time to time, especially during heavy rainfalls. Fortunately the filtration system we were starting up was specifically designed to remove that dirt before throwing it all right back into the distribution system in one big "slug." That system paid for itself in the first 5 minutes of operation!

I can only hope that the mindset will change in North America to one of preventative maintenance, rather than reactive. This mindset is by no means limited to mechanical maintenance, but when a simple solution exists - the arguments for not fixing the problem tend to lose their weight... Fortunately the attendees at these tradeshows know their stuff. They know the problems they deal with, and understand the concepts on how to fix them. Hopefully they'll rub off on everyone else!

Are we Neglecting our Groundwater?

I read an article today outlining the importance of stepping up our proper management of groundwater across this country. I have to say, this is an interesting and often neglected topic within water management circles. In Canada, the majority of water systems use surface water as the primary water source and so most of the attention revolves around the quality of our lakes and rivers while sometimes neglecting the importance of the water beneath us. I believe there are a few reasons for this: 1) 2/3rd of our population is served by surface water. 2) Surface water has the effect of immediacy - We see it. We feel it. We swim in it. Our dogs swim in it. We dump our refuse straight into it. We have immediate feedback on any significant changes that might be taking place to these water supplies (seen a recent picture of Lake Mead?). 3) We aren't the only users of surface water - we have to watch out for fish and wildlife stocks that depend on these surface sources for survival.

While all of these are good reasons to stand up and take notice of what is happening on the surface, it does sometimes sweep groundwater issues under the rug. We need to keep the magnifying glass pointed just as directly as groundwater. With 10 million Canadians alone (and how many more around the world?) depending on groundwater the issues are worth paying attention to. While surface water has the effect of immediacy, groundwater unfortunately has the opposite effect. It takes time, a long time, for the cause and effect cycle underground. Any large scale contamination that happens on the surface often takes years to seep down into the underlying aquifers. There have been a number of large-scale aquifer contaminations from various pollutants, agricultural chemicals, and industrial pollutants. Nitrates and rocket fuel additives being two often-cited examples all over North America. Household pharmaceuticals seem to be another growing area of concern.

Fortunately, there are efforts underway to begin mapping groundwater, both in terms of quantity and quality. In BC there is a provincially funded program to create and monitor test wells. These test wells will start accumulating data to monitor and measure how the aquifers respond to seasonal changes and year to year use. The program is only a few years old, and woefully underfunded so a proper history of groundwater is still a long way off. And here's one very unfortunate observation I've made over the last few years: while it can take a very long time for downward problems to show up, the upward problems can happen frighteningly fast. We have a number of customers that have learned first-hand how dramatically water conditions can change in a short period of time. We have clients who just a few years ago had top producing wells with excellent quality water. Within just a few years their wells are now going dry towards the end of the summer. And as you can imagine, as water quantity goes down, quality generally goes right with it. I have my own theories as to what has caused this, but it all boils down to one inescapable fact - we can and do pull it out of the ground far faster than it will naturally replenish itself. Sound like a familiar story?

I, for one, don't think we can push these groundwater initiatives forward fast enough. We just don't have enough information to arm ourselves properly for the challenges to come. With a few exceptions, we are only guessing at what is really happening underground as we just don't have enough historical information to guide us. And if you can't measure it, you can't manage it.

The article on groundwater management is at http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=1583292

Watertiger.net's all dressed up!

This week, a short one! Instead of a normal commentary, I'd like to introduce Watertiger's new webpage. Our website has always shown a large cross section of the products that we sell and install, but has never properly represented the array of services we offer in addition to product sales. The new section of our website at www.watertiger.net now demonstrates some of the extra services we offer in the commercial, industrial, and small municipal spaces. Check out the website to see the latest incarnation! If you have any questions on who we are or what we do, feel free to contact us. We always love to hear from our clients, past, present and future!