So tired of the phrase “our water is precious” or “brown lawns are like gold”; what a bunch of brainwashed bunk. I also get tired of the refrain that those who want a green lawn are the bad guys. They aren’t the bad guys. They care about their property. Those who don’t care or are unaware that it adds to the outside temperature are the ones who want brown lawns. Black top gives off 30% more heat than green lawns and brown lawns give off 15% more heat. I use an electric lawn mower to cut carbon emissions into the air and run it approximately an hour a week, but my lawn gives off oxygen 112 hours a week resulting in moisture that cools the area.
The city council already knows we will have a bigger problem 10 years out with a larger population and more commercial usage. Our main problem is not lack of water, it’s the lack of water management and a lack of creative ideas by our municipalities. Unlike California, we do live in a rain forest. We need municipalities to come up with creative ideas on how to tap all the rain we get all fall and winter. Presently, their only solution is to stop lawn watering and call those who do ‘water wasters’ stating that “our water is precious”.
If water is that precious then you can buy my runoff rain water from my roof and put it into 20 tanker trucks and I will give you a bargain rate for my very precious water of only $1.00 a litre. My roof of only 1,500 sq feet would get an average of 233,475 liters a year; all of which goes down the storm sewer and does nothing for the environment. I would like to address our municipal lack of water management with a simple solution. Start now to require that every new structure built in the area install a $10,000 to $20,000 cistern (don’t forget our water is precious and land values in proportion are much higher). Set up two water systems: one for drinking (municipal) and one for outside taps and toilets etc. (Rain runoff) Part of the water from the roof would be collected in the rainy season and used for toilets and lawn watering, etc. in the summer. The cistern would take up no more area than the driveway or parking area and would be underneath; no area of the property is wasted and a water saving cistern which should hold no less than 60,000 litres is in place. This would allow lawn watering of 4 hours a week (1440 gallons) for 10 weeks even with no summer rain for that period. By the way the cost is approximately $300 for 24,000 gallons of water from municipal sources (including sewer rate) but running water from the cistern would only cost $4.08 using a 1hp pump to pump the same amount.
Problem for a long term solution solved, with just a little money that can be financed and the city should give a 25% cut on water rates to those with the system.
Ken Watson
