Los Angeles Considers Mandatory Rainwater Capture

[Dover]

Newsbrief from Environmental Building News
March 1, 2010

Los Angeles Considers Mandatory Rainwater Capture

The Los Angeles Department of Public Works (LADPW) has approved an ordinance that would require the capture and reuse of stormwater by new homes, large developments, and certain redevelopments in the city. If signed into law, the ordinance would apply to runoff from ¾-inch (or greater) rainstorms, requiring 100% reuse or infiltration, thereby preventing an estimated 104 million gallons of polluted water from entering the ocean. Mitigation fees, which the Building Industry Association (BIA) has opposed, would apply to builders who are unable to fulfill the requirements of the ordinance. Negotiations between LADPW and BIA have yielded a $13 per gallon fee for neglected rainwater—originally set at $20—and the option of cleaning runoff in a high-efficiency bio-filtration system before releasing it. Collected fees would finance future low-impact public development projects. The ordinance, if passed, would be effective by 2011.

Illinois
Bill turns rainwater into toilet water - A bill passed by the Illinois Senate Environment Committee Feb 24 will make it easier for businesses and homeowners to collect rainwater to be used for non-potable uses, such as flushing toilets. The bill, Rainwater Harvesting for Non-Potable Uses, is co-sponsored by state Sen. Susan Garrett (D-Highwood) and state Rep. Kevin McCarthy (D-Orland Park) and if passed would require the Illinois Department of Public Health to develop standards for rainwater capture, ensuring that rainwater could not enter the public water supply.
http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/chicago/news.aspx?id=160750


Utah
Local News8 - Utah OKs rainwater harvesting - Senate Bill 32 would permit the collection of no more than 2,500 gallons in a storage container. If it becomes law Utahns wouldn't be able to just put out barrels in the backyard. The proposal requires registering with the state and buying a standardized container.
http://www.localnews8.com/Global/story.asp?S=12077576

Other States
http://www.harvesth2o.com/statues_regulations.shtml


Rainwater Harvesting Community - Harvest H2O.com
http://www.harvesth2o.com/


LA Green Infrastructure Report
http://www.lacitysan.org/wpd/Siteorg/program/Complete-Grn-Infrastruct.pdf

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

1. In some states, collecting rainwater is illegal.

unless you own the groundwater-rights, installing a cisturn or collecting rainwater is illegal.

[Dover]

2. Are you sure that's current?

I recall something awhile back about that...maybe in New Mexico and Colorado(??) but not
sure if that's still the case. Do you know?

[kestrel91316]

3. Colorado recently modified its draconian rainwater laws so that

people with well water could harvest rainwater, but anyone with public water still cannot. It's only slightly less assinine. Has to do with ancient water rights that Kansas holds. Kansas basically owns all CO rain.

[msongs]

4. would love to have cisterns here in so cal but storage tanks are TOO expensive nt

[Kolesar]

5. There is a skyscraper in New York that uses sump-groundwater to flush toilets

They moderately filter and treat it before distributing it throughout the building.

[Dogmudgeon]

6. That's the hard way

Why not invest in a series of desalinization plants along the Pacific coast?

Something like THAT would be a tremendous boon in the use of solar energy. There are so many ways it could be done that I'm wondering why it has gotten so little attention. Granted, there are many engineering "gotchas" to be worked out, but it seems like it would be a better goal for R&D than, say, the solar-panel-paved streets we were all gushing over lately.

Solve the Southwest's water problem, and those solar roadways could be developed at our un-thirsty leisure.

--d!

[Statistical]

8. $$$. Pure and simple it is all about the $$$.

There is no water crisis in CA or anywhere.
There simply is a CHEAP water crisis.

Desalination plants are expensive. Cost is about triple what people currently pay for water. If you can convince people that the price of water is artificially low and unsustainable then you have solved water crisis.

However solar power is also extremely expensive. Combine solar power we desal plant and you have even more expensive water.

All the gnashing of teeth in CA (and other places) about water rights and water crisis is simply a fight over cheap water.

On a similar note there is no energy crisis there is simply a cheap energy crisis.

[Dogmudgeon]

10. That's interesting. Disappointing, but interesting.

I wasn't aware that desalinization was so expensive, and had heard that solar desalinization was much cheaper than fuel-using desalinization. The solar energy methods used cover a wide range, but some are little more than pumping seawater into sun-heated tanks and collecting the rising steam. Scalability may not be good. OTOH, if any application was suited to solar heat use, I'd think desalinization was one of them.

Back to the library for me, I guess ...

The matter of cheapness, of course, is a little trickier. Most of our economy is conducted based on manipulating certain "cheapnesses". And where something isn't cheap, it is made cheap by state support -- the entire petroleum/car culture is based on that, and it seems as though wind energy simply can not exist without >$20/MWe supply price supports. And much to my dismay -- I also thought wind would be a better deal, and have only recently begun to lose my religion on that one, after things like the recent German wind, solar, and biogas debacles under "Siggi Pop" Gabriel.

I have a more grandiose WAF (Wild-Assed Fantasy) -- use geoengineering-scale solar desal, irrigate the great equatorial deserts (Sonora, Sahara, Arabian, Australian), re-forest them, and wipe out 300 years of carbon gas abuse in under a century. "So easy a caveman could do it", right?

Oh, well. Y'know, there are some Well-Respected Scientists who think we can run the world's energy grid using a scant 1,500,000 wind turbines, and mandating solar roofs on every residential building in the world (only ~1.7bln). Guess I'm in good company!

--d!
I am an Environmentalist
of Constant Sorrow ...

[Statistical]

11. Agreed our economy has a lot of externalized costs and subsidized costs.

Coal is "cheap" because carbon is free and penalties for environmental damage are negligible. If coal companies were charged carbon tax PLUS fees reflecting true economic damage coal it would be up there with most expensive forms of power.

Wind needs the $20/MWh subsidy but it is the closet to reaching wholesale parity without subsidies (PV solar is far far worse). The bad news is that we can't afford to pay $20/MWh when we are generating billions of Mwh worth of wind so as amount of wind capacity grows the subsidy in per MWh dollars will need to decline (even though total nominal dollars will increase).

It remains to be seen how much new wind capacity is installed after the subsidy is reduced or dropped. Uncertainly doesn't help. Would be useful in govt made longer term plans. Like subsidy will be $20 per Mwh until generation reaches X then it drops to $12 per Mwh until y then it drops to $8 per Mwh etc.



More than anything we need true cost of carbon to be considered. $25 per ton works out to about 1 cents per coal kWh (about half that for NG). $50 per ton is 2 cents. This would be enough to partially offset loss/reduction in wind subsidies.

Carbon tax wouldn't solve all our problems but it would bring internalized cost of fossil fuels more in line with true costs.

[Dover]

12. After traveling in Europe where drinking water has a significant commercial market

(rarely does a restaurant serve tap water), I returned to the U.S. and free tap water wondering how long it would take for privatization to sieze our water too. And there is a very clear agenda by government agencies too (at least in Texas) to change citizen's views on the value of water.
They say it's so people will stop wasting it. And while there may be some truth to that, my gut feeling is that privatization isn't far behind. Both Dems and Reps are pro-privatization in general.
I think citizens are going to have to take a stand if they want to preserve as a collective right at least SOME life-sustaining resources such as water (as a public utility). Or they are going to each have to collect rain water if they want to preserve a 'cheap' source. Of course then there is that right-of-capture that landowners insist upon maintaining (water below their properties). So there already is at least one form of water ownership by individuals. I think landowners should probably be allowed to 'own it' provided they don't sell it - it must be used on the land - and that their use does not detrimentally affect their neighbor's supply.
But then developers can't just build anywhere without taking existing water supplies into a account.
But then.......sigh.
Water rights/law is such a sticky wicket.

I don't know what the answer is, though I know my grandfather tore down his residential cistern declaring it a thing of the past.

[Ratty]

7. Won't that make the oceans saltier?

Poor fish

[kestrel91316]

13. No. The piddly little bit of rain that all of man's efforts could capture

is literally just a drop in the bucket.

[Lex87]

9. Rain water storage is a problem?

This is very interesting that each state has different concerns. I know there are communities that have found excessive water collection is bad, leading to problems in the natural water system, but I hadn't considered the impacts of rain water getting into drinking water?

My uncle lives out there doing some Los Angeles IT consulting work and he did remark that the smog/pollution is a bit depressing so I'm guessing the concern is towards acid/polluted rain sources?

How much is 2,500 gallons?? (I just looked, here's a round tank dimensions: Diameter: 95 inches Height: 90 inches Weight: 339 pounds!!)

Who the heck would have the resources or space to go beyond that residentially?! Here's a picture of what a tank that big looks like:


Seems like a really odd thing to pass a bill over.. but not a bad limit?

[NNadir]

14. "Now why don't you just take it easy, Group Captain, and please make me a drink of grain alcohol...

...and rainwater, and help yourself to whatever you'd like."



Using rainwater should help allay the concerns of Jack T. Ripper and his colleague Ralph Nader, both of whom seem concerned with their precious bodily fluids.