WATER CONSERVATION

[Flash]

Not all who move here from liberal cesspools are liberal.

My weekly shooting group has 4 people from libtard states, 1 from New Jersey, 1 from New York and 2 from New Hampshire/Massachusetts. All of these peoples politics are further to the right than a bicycle rider on the Autobahn in spite of the fact that they were born, raised and spent their entire lives up to retirement living in those places.

OTOH, if they weren't conservative, I wouldn't let them in my group.

 

[Winston_Wolf]

WEll, being a native, i've watched the water controversy go on and on. but to no avail.
NOw if one was to look at the water usage of say; 20 years ago, versus now, one would see a huge uptick in usage, and if one would look at the availability of water resources, one would see a huge DOWN tick.
MOst of az water comes from the Colorado, and ground pumping, colorado is over whelmed, and yet more folks want to plant friggin grass, more golf courses, more green belts,
if one was to review what the City of Phx. is doing is . for example the airport which had a huge green belt is now a desert landscape, well there you go, think on this, water savings, maintenance savings, ect. An incredible amount of water, now if irrigated thats one thing, but sprinkler systems have and are known to not be efficient nor full functional.

So here we are, i'd say in next 5-10 years with our growth, we will have a major water issue, as in some areas, water is outrageous to purchase, with our prolonged drought, and lack of conservation, it may happen sooner, no snow pack, no spring rains up north, monsoons in last few years have been disastorous, begin conservation now i say, get the water busters back out on the street, they got on the water conservation plan in the early 80s but dropped it, go figure, stupid is stupid does.

I know its a desert, and one can kinda treat it like that, where prudent, but water, it makes the world work, and makes Phoenix, work, well all of Arizona.

Rj

... good post, yeah, I'm sure Arizona is on the cusp of severe water shortages in coming years. I try not to waste it

 

[338lapua]

Back when I was in high school early 70s, we were being told AZ would run out of water if population doubled. Mesa had 40,000 back then.

I have been hearing for a long time that golf courses use reclaimed water...really. Anyone want to explain how that is done, since I don't think they run pipe from s*** water plant to every golf course.

Cities run lines when they widen streets and as they expand, some even have lines run years before they connect to waste water plants. When they have enough projects to handle flow they start connecting to the shit water pipes and let it flow. I had projects where we purple piped the project and had to wait a year for the reclaimed to get piped to us. Most projects running shit water have pumping stations or booster pumps as there is a lot of volume but not always pressure. This whole thing is a balancing act to say the least.

My largest project had 15 lakes that could hold close to 20 million gallons and we had several pumping stations that distributed water through 12-36" main lines to the 15 golf courses we managed irrigation for and the 20 or so master planned developments we maintained. We could go through the 20 million gallons in a week during the summer and in winter we pumped some of it into the ground on the same projects. A lot of fun getting to waste that much water and getting thanked for it.

I still log into the system and will cover vacationing managers as there are not many that can run these systems remotely. I still consult with several companies on these matters. I will say this much about that water, if you see purple valve boxes it is the nasty water and don't get it on you. It can give you some nasty skin problems. Don't let your kids play in the sprinklers either. Nobody really knows how safe this stuff really is. There also may be acid in the water as I installed countless sulfur burners to make Sulfurous Acid on site to buffer the water.

Phoenix I don't know much about their program but the east valley cities were on it with the distribution system as they expanded their cities. As they built roads and moved south the pipes were put in and as we built the master planned communities we connected to them and they increased flow for us. East valley got it right, rest of Az not so much.

Phoenix and Scottsdale it is a bigger problem piping the water to courses as the cities are mostly built and the pipe would most likely be put in as streets and storm sewers replaced or widened. According to a article I just read only a couple of Phoenix courses are on reclaimed later this year at it is a 9 million dollar project to get the water there. Nobody planned for this originally and only the east valley really jumped on it as they saw potential to grow their towns and tax base

https://www.wwdmag.com/water-recycling-reuse/arizona-golf-courses-use-recycled-wastewater-irrigation

Cities have been complicit in the depletion of water by forcing builders to install heavy plantings on new projects especially Phoenix which uses drinking water for landscapes. They orce the same crap on homeowners as well. I remember planting plants still in containers and waiting until after the city inspection and digging them up and taking them back to our nurseries as once installed there are no requirements about whether the plants live or not. Cities also need to get the EFF out of landscape architecture requirements, I remember on one project planting over 3,500 trees under power lines that were also 10-12 feet from a four lane road, close to 500K billed to client and every tree had to be removed within 5 years as they were in the lines.

 

[knockonit]

actually, a lot of the golf courses buy reclaimed water and then sell to courses that can recieve the water, and use the sales $$ to use potable water for course, or trade for pumped water.
its a balancing act, only about 30 percent of golf courses in Phoenix, use reclaimed water in real time, they buy it as mentioned and sell it off, but in reality utilize potable water. just saying
Rj

 

[338lapua]

actually, a lot of the golf courses buy reclaimed water and then sell to courses that can recieve the water, and use the sales $$ to use potable water for course, or trade for pumped water.
its a balancing act, only about 30 percent of golf courses in Phoenix, use reclaimed water in real time, they buy it as mentioned and sell it off, but in reality utilize potable water. just saying
Rj

Sounds like something Al Gore would like, kind of like his carbon credit trading company.

 

[storage_man]

Most of the Scottsdale's up scale golf courses are on re-claimed water. It been going on there for over 25 years. Many of the golf courses in later Sun City developments have also been set up for Re-claimed water. But RJ is right on many of the courses in the city of phoenix don't have it. There is a project right now where they are tearing up T-bird from just east of 7th st to 22nd Ave to run a potable water line to the city course on 19th & T-bird, The Moon valley C.C. & The Point Golf course. The city is running the line from the AZ canal north thru the Cave Creek wash to T-bird. This will save the courses $.30 on a dollar of processed/drinkable water that they use now. No water savings but cheaper watering costs for those courses.

 

[action magic]

Something to ponder:
According to american immigration council.org there are 205,923 "undocumented" residing in AZ as of 2015. I would be willing to bet that that number is very easily double. Just my opinion...
The average use of water per day per person is 80 gallons on the low side. Using just this info that equates to 16,473,840 gallons. Per Day in 2015. Now add in the balance of illegals in this country. The number is staggering.
Bottom line: should we be frugal with our resources, hell yes but lets stop putting the onus on those that are conserving and paying and not on those that are stealing. FWIW

 

[Jack Dupp]

I bet that number is WAAAAAAAY more than double. Like easily over a million.

 

[Tim McBride]

80 gallons a day per person! LOL, People are wasteful with water. I'd be filling my water tank here every 4 days at that rate.

 

[action magic]

Oh yes, I agree whole heartedly as to a true number.
Unfortunately 80 gallons per person per day (USGS specs) is on the low side.
Tis unfortunate that those that pay for it and make the efforts are the ones that are taken advantage of and demonized by rate hikes et al (because higher prices will magically make more water appear. Just like electricity APS / SRP. Greedy Mother Truckers).

 

[Tim McBride]

It costs me $55 for 2000gallons delivered.
You guys on municipal water have got it good.

 

[Suck My Glock]

Back when I was in high school early 70s, we were being told AZ would run out of water if population doubled. Mesa had 40,000 back then.

I have been hearing for a long time that golf courses use reclaimed water...really. Anyone want to explain how that is done, since I don't think they run pipe from s*** water plant to every golf course.

Yes, we have been hearing this a long time. Not to discount the real threat, whatever that may actually be,...but the fear mongering causes one to develop a tin ear.

My aunt had been a hydraulogist(?) employed by San Jose for over 40 years. As part of that job she would attend various conventions and confabs across the nation where water resources were the topics of discussion. Back in 1991, one of those was held here in Phoenix, and of course our particular situation became a model for discussion. She spoke to me with a degree of alarm about how greater Maricopa County was doomed because we had only less than 30 years of ground water left in our underground aquifers,...and that was if our population was stagnant and had 0% growth!

I was indeed alarmed at that news, because she was a professional in the field and this info came from experts. Yet, here we are,...and if that data was accurate,...why have we not run dry? Now I suppose there has been a great deal of effort to rectify things, and that may have had great effect. But I doubt those effects have been a greater percentage of gained efficiency than the percentage of gained population. It all has about the same feel as the global warming "the sky is falling" wailing BS. Except that there likely is indeed a problem here. But that problem gets hard to pay proper attention to when our "leaders" only know how to be alarmists.

 

[baja]

Water is a serious problem here yet, as was mentioned earlier, we continue to sell land to large developers.
The 100 year assured water supply is a joke, if the Colorado River spigot was turned off the Valley would never last 100 years.
The way the drought is going it could even get rough with a diminished Colorado flow and continued unbridled growth.

 

[Ballistic Therapy]

I have a private well.
My Dad put it in 56 years ago.
The pump is at 350 feet.
When it was dug water was hit at 105 feet.
In the 90's it was down to 175 feet.
The last time it was check ( around 2006 ) the water level had come back up to 165 feet.
When this well was dug it was the only well around for miles.
As people started buying land around they ask if they could tap into the well.
Back in those days people helped out their neighbors.
In hindsight he never would have done it.
As time went by people started cutting up their property and selling it off.
Now the well serves 38 separate residents.
What a hassle it has become.

 

[Steve_In_29]

This all makes sense... but you need water to recover reclaimed water.

You do but this is saving millions of gallons of drinking water from being used on golf courses or landscapes. It is also giving more area for the excess water to evaporate and eventually form clouds and rain. Some day according to the plans I saw houses will have a hookup to reclaimed for landscape use. The downside is the water is smelly.

Yes but by controlling development and slowing population growth that water stays in the ground and so doesn't need to be "reclaimed".

The water used for greenery doesn't form clouds and return as rain. Someone sold you a bill of good on that idea.

 

[Steve_In_29]

And as if the greenery wasn't sucking up enough water there is this....“Pumped Storage” Project in Big Chino Valley

Where huge amounts of water are going to be used to keep the electricity flowing to Phoenix (and other places) while evaporation requires constant pumping to keep the reservoirs topped off.

 

[338lapua]

This all makes sense... but you need water to recover reclaimed water.

You do but this is saving millions of gallons of drinking water from being used on golf courses or landscapes. It is also giving more area for the excess water to evaporate and eventually form clouds and rain. Some day according to the plans I saw houses will have a hookup to reclaimed for landscape use. The downside is the water is smelly.

Yes but by controlling development and slowing population growth that water stays in the ground and so doesn't need to be "reclaimed".

The water used for greenery doesn't form clouds and return as rain. Someone sold you a bill of good on that idea.

Some of it does evaporate and some of it evaporates before it hits the ground.

 

[Steve_In_29]

You do but this is saving millions of gallons of drinking water from being used on golf courses or landscapes. It is also giving more area for the excess water to evaporate and eventually form clouds and rain. Some day according to the plans I saw houses will have a hookup to reclaimed for landscape use. The downside is the water is smelly.

Yes but by controlling development and slowing population growth that water stays in the ground and so doesn't need to be "reclaimed".

The water used for greenery doesn't form clouds and return as rain. Someone sold you a bill of good on that idea.

Some of it does evaporate and some of it evaporates before it hits the ground.

I never said the water didn't evaporate, just that it doesn't lead to cloud formation and rain. There simply isn't enough moisture from that source. The rain in AZ comes from storms that start over the Pacific Ocean (winter) and the Gulf of Mexico (monsoons).

So like I said anyone saying reclaimed water is increasing rainfall is selling snake oil to the naive.

 

[knockonit]

Big joke as far as i'm concerned.

az.s water conservation web site, ugh

http://www.azwater.gov/AzDWR/StatewidePlanning/Conservation2/default.htm

 

[knockonit]

California is a big drinker, don't think they will lay down a battle if their share of the colorado or any other water shed is in danger, the whole southwest has been in a drought cycle for about 20 years or more, and not one thing is being done to conserve water, take a look around, incredible amount of waste running down the street,

If one was under the impression that srp is water conscious, yeah right, only if you dont follow their rules on water. whether its via irrigation or potable. just saying,
Rj