We Live in a "People Aquarium"…and the Water Is Running Out
This article was originally published on Strong Towns member Johnny Sanphillippo’s blog, Granola Shotgun. It is shared here with permission. All images for this piece were provided by the author.
I’ll start with a definition: Subsidiarity “is a principle of social organization that holds that social and political issues should be dealt with at the most immediate (or local) level that is consistent with their resolution.” Keep that concept in mind.
This is the Bon Tempe reservoir in Marin County on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge just north of San Francisco. On a perfect summer day, it’s a lovely place to walk the dog, get a little exercise, and enjoy some fresh air. Bon Tempe is an artificial lake that’s part of a daisy chain of stair-step reservoirs, each spilling over to the next in a gravity-fed arrangement. Looking at the lake you wouldn’t think there was a drought, but you’d be wrong. Marin County has recently activated mandatory water restrictions to conserve dwindling supplies. The official goal is to reduce demand by 40%. So far consumption is only down 30% from normal usage levels.
This is Alpine Lake, on the other side of Bon Tempe Dam. In a good year with sufficient rain, the water in Alpine Lake would come right up to the dam and all this dry territory would be submerged. Today, the lake is a shriveled puddle, as are many others in the region this year.
The amount of water held in a reservoir is deceiving. These water storage structures have a “V” or “U” shape. The top layer of a reservoir is wider than the bottom and therefor holds a much larger volume of water. As a reservoir is drained, the rate at which it depletes increases at an ever-faster rate. In the beginning of a drought the lake looks completely full. Then it looks mostly full. Then it looks only a little less full. Then it becomes nearly empty all at once as the water level sinks into the bottom of the “V.” A shallow, half-empty reservoir of warm water also loses significantly more water to evaporation during a heat wave just when demand for water is at its highest.
The geology and hydrology of Marin don’t lend themselves to huge groundwater reserves. The rocks aren’t porous enough to hold much liquid. Pumping the sandy patches beyond a very limited point pulls in salt water from the sea or brackish water from the bay, neither of which are drinkable. There are plenty of seasonal creeks, but not much in the way of year-round streams and certainly not a lot that flows sufficiently in a multiyear drought to support the population.
These reservoirs are fed entirely by rain and nothing else. A century ago, local officials set aside 22,000 acres of protected watershed public lands to capture rain from the hillsides and store it in the ravines. There’s a natural variation with cycles of rain and drought that come with California’s Mediterranean-style climate. The existing water supply is designed to last for a number of years of normal use even without much rain. But if the rains don’t eventually return, there’s a serious problem with no Plan B.
When these reservoirs were first built in 1922, Marin County had a total population of 23,000 people and the water distribution system was focused on a handful of established towns along the waterfront and flat valleys. These settlements tended to have compact footprints which were easy to serve with a limited number of pipes and gravity. It was a simple and elegant system that supplied these small towns well with a generous reserve capacity.
As the population of Marin grew, particularly after World War II, the development pattern shifted. New construction spread out in every direction and homes were built high up on the hillsides to capture desirable views. Industrial pumps were installed to push water uphill to elevated storage tanks at night when electricity is cheaper. The water then flows down from the tanks each day as needed through a series of attenuated distribution pipes. This was the second round of public infrastructure investment, and the next step up in terms of expense and complexity in exchange for growth and added value.
These systems are now 50 to 70 years old and are connected to the original 100-year-old mains, dams, and reservoirs. Pipes generally have a design life of less than that and nothing shy of continuous maintenance and replacement will keep things going. That is an expensive and never-ending process.
Subsequent generations augmented the local water system in the 1960s and 1970s to include the purchase of water from Sonoma County to the north. The required pipeline and pumping stations were installed to draw water from the Russian River, with a collection of legal agreements to share the cost and benefits of the multi-county infrastructure expansion. This was done explicitly to allow the population to grow and businesses to expand. The resulting flow typically covers 25% of Marin County’s overall needs, but the towns in the northern part of Marin are physically reliant on Sonoma for 75% of their water.
It’s worth pointing out that private water companies used to own and manage many of these systems and were given the choice to continue supplying the region through the expansion. They made the business decision to cash out rather than invest in the larger systems. It’s also important to mention that there were repeated ballots on the topic of public water infrastructure expansion with related fee increases that failed to achieve voter approval in wet years, but ultimately passed in dry years.
Unfortunately, this year Sonoma’s water levels are so low that they’re unable to spare much. Consequently, flows to Marin are being reduced in keeping with written agreements established decades ago. If the drought continues there’s the real possibility that Marin may be cut off entirely. Of course, Sonoma is dependent on the Russian River for much of its municipal water. That river is fed from rain falling in Mendocino County even farther north, and Mendocino is really dry these days.
The current plan under consideration involves building a temporary pipeline over the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge. That pipe would connect to the existing water supply systems in Contra Costa County to the east. Contra Costa wouldn’t supply the water directly. They’re having their own water supply problems these days. Instead, it would serve as a conduit and processing facility for water that Marin would buy from farmers with water rights in the Central Valley even farther to the east. This would be a return to an option that was employed briefly in 1977–1978 during a previous drought that was even more severe than the current one. But after one year the pipeline was removed when the rains returned.
That’s one of the problems with managing the water supply in a part of the world where rain is cyclical. Several years of low or no rain are followed by intense heavy rains which typically cause flooding, mudslides, and erosion. Politically, taking preventive action in the wet years to fortify water supplies in the dry years is troublesome. It requires the voting population to pay for infrastructure capacity that goes unused most of the time. People generally don’t like that. But they also don’t like curtailment or higher prices in a crisis.
That brings us to a sticky situation. What happens when the law provides for X, but nature only agrees to Y, and hard choices need to be made? Since it’s difficult to sue the rain for specific performance, residents sometimes engage in legal action against the relevant water authorities. A fair number of people have strong opinions on government-mandated rationing, tiered pricing, and rate increases. They’re in the “waste, fraud, and abuse” camp and “I know my rights, damn it!”
Technically, they’re right, given existing legislation. In 1996, Proposition 218 was passed by California voters and it’s now illegal for government agencies to charge more in fees than it costs to provide a service. So, a tiered pricing system that charges high-use customers a higher fee during a drought sometimes violates that law. In a strict interpretation of the law, water would be used at the standard price right up until the reservoirs were empty. Then (and only then) would alternatives be authorized at a much higher and legal cost basis. But that’s problematic for several reasons. Most notably, the water and infrastructure to deliver it doesn’t yet exist.
I don’t want to give a false impression. Most residents of Marin are aware of the water shortage and do make an effort to conserve—some with great zeal. And there are many people living in modest accommodations that genuinely use the bare minimum of water even under ordinary circumstances. The apartment dwellers use almost no water relative to a comfortable suburban home with a lawn and a swimming pool. And those suburban homes use almost nothing compared to agriculture.
The breakdown of water consumption in California is clear: 5% indoor use, 5% outdoor landscaping, 10% industry, and 80% agriculture. But Marin has almost no industry and isn’t a big agricultural county. Farming, forestry, hunting, and fishing combined are 0.09% of the county’s economy. And local farmers aren’t connected to the state or municipal water systems in any case. So, Marin’s problem is much closer to 50% indoor use and 50% landscaping.
Water agencies know how to increase the water supply, but are prevented from doing so by a collection of well-organized groups from various factions. For example, in order to expand the rainwater catchment areas and build new dams, the government would have to engage in eminent domain to seize private property on certain hillsides and valleys. That would immediately involve endless lawsuits and public outrage. “Jack-booted thugs from the government and/or profit-seeking corporations are stealing my land!” Even if land were to be diverted to public use willingly, compensating the owners at prevailing market value (millions and millions and millions of dollars per parcel) would make for an interesting cost-benefit ratio.
Recycling wastewater with higher levels of treatment is one technique that’s being used on a small scale in select parts of Marin. It’s one of the things that can be done without too much political pushback. Sewerage is collected from the community, processed to a high standard, and piped to nearby golf courses and office parks for irrigation of lawns and ornamental landscapes. This is the low-hanging fruit. But if 100% of all the sewerage in Marin were reused in this manner it would double the required county infrastructure, as each cul-de-sac on every hillside was given a parallel set of purple pipes to water the lawns and top off the swimming pools. That’s simply not going to scale.
A far more efficient system would be to clean the water to a drinkable standard and send it back up to the reservoirs in a single direct pipeline. That would radically increase the available drinking water supply and close the emergency reduction target. San Diego already does exactly that. By 2035, 40% of San Diego’s drinking water will come from recycled wastewater that’s returned to their reservoirs. But Marin is so far reluctant to seriously consider this option. It’s dismissed by vocal detractors as “toilet to tap” and many people simply can’t get over the emotional eeeeeeeww factor, regardless of the science behind the process.
Strong Towns members are changing the conversation about growth and development in North America. If you want to join the movement, then consider becoming a member today:
Another option is desalination, which would take the abundant local supply of salt water and make it drinkable. The tradeoffs are money, energy consumption, and environmental side effects. In 2010 Marin voters were asked to weigh in on a proposed desalination project and it passed. Sort of. There were two competing and contradictory questions on the ballot that led to all sorts of confusion. This is one little part of a long tedious topic, with all manner of twists and turns that I won’t go into here. The end result is that Marin never built the plant, even though a majority of voters technically agreed in principle to the concept.
Proponents of desalination often point, once again, to San Diego, which has the largest desalination facility in the Western Hemisphere. The plant enjoys broad popular support from the general public, even though water in San Diego is slightly more expensive and there are some environmental consequences that also cost money to mitigate. At 50 million gallons per day, the plant supplies 15% of San Diego’s drinking water. That’s enough to serve 400,000 homes. It’s the margin of error in a drought year.
In contrast, Santa Barbara built a desalination plant in a panicked response to the droughts of the late 1980s. That plant was made redundant soon after it was installed when above average rain arrived in 1991. It then sat unused, costing the city money every year just to keep it mothballed. Taxpayers looked at the idle desalination facility and accused the water authorities of squandering huge sums of public money on an expensive boondoggle. Environmentalists were none too pleased, either. Desalination uses a serious amount of energy and discharges brine back into the sea. Santa Barbara has a similar demographic to Marin’s (wealthy, old, opinionated, and litigious), with a parallel political culture.
Now that we’re back to drought conditions, Santa Barbara dusted off the old plant, rebuilt it to more modern and efficient standards, and ramped up water production once again. Desalination now contributes 30% of Santa Barbara’s drinking water. Managing a cyclical wet–dry climate with a short-term memory electorate is challenging. But one way or another the water always wins. You either pay for it, or you live without it. Pick your poison.
Places that opt for technological fixes like long pipelines and massive pumping stations, wastewater recycling, and desalination get the water they need. But it comes at the expense of complexity and vulnerability. I call this the People Aquarium. We’ve built a human habitat that requires an elaborate set of machines to keep us alive, just like the tropical fish in a tank. It works, but it’s delicate and exposed to the risk of disruption.
I want to get back to the principle of subsidiarity. Let’s say, hypothetically, something happened to the water supply in any place you care to name. How exactly would ordinary people manage while the authorities sorted things out? This isn’t entirely theoretical, given recent events in places like Flint, Michigan. Instead of directing angst and anger at the larger convoluted intertwined systems and the folks who run the People Aquarium, it might be worth exploring what can be done at the household level.
One technique for making a suburban landscape more drought resistant is to capture and store rainwater in the soil itself. A series of trenches and depressions in the earth fill up whenever it rains. Old logs, straw, and wood chips in the trenches keep the ground level and act like sponges to hold the water, while slowly breaking down and becoming carbon-rich soil. This prevents rain from running off and causing floods downhill. It won’t keep a lawn lush and green, but it will allow trees and shrubbery to get by with a lot less irrigation in the dry season.
Capturing rain from the roof and storing it in inexpensive secondhand barrels or large, fairly pricy tanks allows for emergency reserve water that isn’t connected to the municipal supply. These containers hold water from wet to dry times and provide a reserve to fall back on for either household or garden needs.
Redirecting used water from the clothes washer and/or shower is relatively easy to do. I’ve done it myself. The level of complexity of home-scale water recycling for irrigation is wildly less costly and more efficient than sending the water to and from the sewerage treatment plant through miles of pipe and up pumping stations. There’s just no need for all the technological bells and whistles at this scale.
In my bolder moments I might even suggest dry composting toilets that would cut a third of a home’s water consumption. Should we really be using perfectly clean drinking water to flush our crap down a pipe? At its simplest this involves a bucket, some sawdust, and a sealed holding drum in the backyard where the solids can slowly break down into rich soil in a couple of years. That soil is then suitable for fertilizing trees and shrubbery. This arrangement requires that we get over our discomfort of physically composting our bodily waste, but it solves the biggest part of the water problem and costs pretty close to nothing.
I understand perfectly well these measures aren’t going to be broadly adopted. The culture won’t accept them even though these straitforward practices could address the drought in a way that’s largely under our own control for pennies on the dollar. Shrug. The dirty little secret is the rains eventually do return and all the sturm and drang are forgotten—until the next drought.
As America’s cities continue their halting climb up and out of the last few years, data analytics firm Urban3 foresees a few crises—as well as opportunities—waiting for them in 2023.