Thursday, August 19, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

WATER CONSERVATION: Authority rethinks drought plan

Revision of criteria might result in delay of emergency declaration

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The drought emergency that was expected to be declared in Southern Nevada early next year might be postponed indefinitely, no matter how dry it gets or how much Lake Mead shrinks.

It all will depend on how much water that valley residents consume.

Citing the success of local conservation measures, the Southern Nevada Water Authority is considering a fundamental change in its drought-stage criteria that would delay an emergency declaration until 2006 at the earliest, even as the record drought deepens.

Emergency is the most severe of three drought stages established by the water authority in February 2003. The designation could mean water-rate hikes, tighter restrictions on water use, larger fines for water scofflaws and an all-out ban on watering "nonfunctional turf" in parking lots and along streets and medians.

"We even discussed not allowing people to refill their swimming pools," said Jeffery van Ee, a local environmentalist who served on a citizens committee set up by the water authority earlier this year to recommend drought emergency measures.

For the moment, though, none of that is necessary, said Pat Mulroy, general manager of the water authority.

"We're watching what the community is doing very, very closely, and the response (to the drought) has been outstanding," Mulroy said.

"There's no need to go to the next step."

Daniel Patterson, desert ecologist with the Tucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity, disagrees. Though valley residents have shown a willingness to conserve when asked, Patterson said Las Vegas still uses more water per-capita than just about any other city in the Southwest.

"I think there has been a pattern of denial by Pat (Mulroy) and the water authority, denial about the long-term water issues in Nevada," he said.

"It's troubling because they're going to have to get really serious about sustainable water use."

As far as Mulroy is concerned, the numbers speak for themselves.

From 2002 to 2003, consumptive water use in the Las Vegas Valley dropped from 318,000 acre-feet to less than 272,000 acre-feet, even while the population of Clark County grew at a rate of about 5,000 people a month.

The valley is on pace to consume less water this year than it did in 2003.

Excluding surplus water that the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation makes available in some years, Nevada's annual allotment of Colorado River water is 300,000 acre-feet.

Arizona receives 2.8 million acre-feet of Colorado River water a year, while California gets 4.4 million acre-feet and Mexico gets 1.5 million acre-feet.

There are about 326,000 gallons in an acre-foot, enough to cover an acre of land in one foot of water. The average Las Vegas Valley household consumes about 230,000 gallons of water a year, according to water authority figures.

Currently, the drought stages used by the water authority are tied directly to the water level at Lake Mead.

The trigger point for drought emergency is a lake level of 1,125 feet above sea level at the start of any year. According to the latest projections from the Bureau of Reclamation, that will occur in January.

But water authority officials now are recommending that the Lake Mead link be dropped in favor of new drought-stage criteria tied directly to the amount of water used in the valley. Exact benchmarks have yet to be set, but an emergency would be declared if water use increases, the drought significantly worsens, or both.

"An emergency should be just that, an emergency," Mulroy said.

But van Ee and Patterson think now is the time for more drought measures, not fewer.

For example, Van Ee said almost no emphasis has been placed on conserving water indoors because Nevada gets return-flow credits for the sewer water it collects, treats and returns to Lake Mead. But it takes money and energy to pump that water, and the more effluent that goes into the lake, the greater the risk to water quality, van Ee said.

Arguably the valley's most successful water conservation effort is the authority's Water Smart landscape program, which pays residents and business owners to replace grass with desert landscaping.

So far this year, 17 million square feet of turf has been converted and $14.7 million in rebates have been paid out in the Las Vegas Valley, up from 11.8 million square feet and $10.2 million in all of 2003.

Since its inception in January 1999, the program has eliminated enough grass to form a roll of turf 18 inches wide and long enough to stretch from Las Vegas to New York City and back.

"Drive around the valley," Mulroy said.

"We're starting to look like a desert community."

The water authority declared a first-stage drought watch in August 2003, resulting, most significantly, in a 25 percent increase in water rates for most valley residents.

The drought watch gave way to a second-stage drought alert on Jan. 1, triggering a ban on front lawns at new homes and restrictions on misting systems and washing cars at home.

To reward the community's response to the call for conservation, the authority and its member utilities later relaxed restrictions on mist systems, ornamental fountains and residential car washing.

Mulroy said there has been a fundamental shift in the way water is used in the community, some of it because of drought awareness, and some of it because of the skyrocketing cost of land, which has reduced the size of residential lots and the amount of landscaping.

"It used to be that a family of five used an acre-foot of water (per year), but it's working down to where a family of five uses half an acre-foot," Mulroy said.

"Quite honestly, we have got the most aggressive urban conservation program in the nation.

"Everybody is looking to us, and that's a real change."