share.triangle.com - Drought questions - Comments

Drought Tolerant Grass

Charles Buchanan — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 10:39:15 -0500

I understand that Bermuda grass take much less water to maintain than fescue grasses. Some areas have mandated bermuda grass for new homes. How about those of us who already have fescue yards. What is the option on converting to a bermuda grass yard?

drought

Rome Fontaine — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 13:47:01 -0500

When looking at the drought map in your article in the 2/22 N&O all of Wake County as well as many other counties are categorized as exceptional. I'm curious to know what the criteria is that defines these classifications? The rainfall percentage relative to normal must weigh far more than having full reservoirs, and ponds. The fact that Jordan Lake is 101% full as well as area ponds vs Falls Lake 47% must have very little to do with the category. Or maybe it is too difficult to make finer distinctions on the map?

restrictions

Andrea Lawson — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:58:50 -0500

I moved to North Carolina from CA almost 13 years ago. The first year there was a drought worry, Cary was put on a resticted even day/odd day allotment with no usage on Monday at all, over the years, that was never changed. It has never been a problem in Cary until this year and if you look, Cary's supply of water has always been longer than anyone else in the triangle. But that is because our mayor have kept this practice in place all these years. Why hasn't it happened in Raleigh? Or Durham or Chapel Hill? Your mayors has only restricted water practices when it was absolutely neccessary, by that time, it is already too late. Because of our changing weather patterns, restrictions should stay in place year after year with no changes. It doesn't bother anyone!

JORDAN LAKE

W. H. CANTEES — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:28:54 -0500

HOW MUCH WATER IN TERMS OF MILLIONS OF GALLONS PER DAY IS PUMPED FROM JORDAN LAKE TO THE VARIOUS MUNICIPAL WATER SYSTEMS FOR DISTRIBUTION?

PLEASE GIVE ME A ROUGH IDEA FOR AN AVERAGE PERIOD OF DECEMBER, JANUARY, AND FEBRUARY. ALSO GIVE ME AN AVERAGE FOR THE PERIOD OF JULY AND AUGUST

Raleigh asleep at the wheel

TWC — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 18:57:54 -0500

I am in agreement with some of the previous comments made about why Raleigh has not made preparations over the past 15-17 years to increase the supply of water available, especially during "drought" conditions. I am a Wake County native, iving here all 54 years of my life and have watched as this area exploded during the 15-17 years mentioned above. I live in southern Wake County, am a licensed General Contractor, and fortunately depend on a well for my water source. My question is why has Raleigh, while experiencing all this growth, and revenue from every single added water meter, acerage fees, impact fees etc. not done something to add to their water supply. Did the powers that be concerning this just think that they had an endless supply on hand? I equate this to me drilling my well, then adding house after house (while charging a fee of course)on it until there just is not enough to go around and then saying to my customers, "You must conserve more!" Oh by the way I'm going to raise your rate too to encourage conservation. How idiotic!It seems that someone in city Government has been asleep at the wheel far too long and it has caught up. Any comments on this? TWC

PS. Wonder why Cary and Apex (both in Wake County) have plenty of water? Better planning maybe?

Well Water coming from Acqua water company to nor. Wake homes

Visitor — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 15:00:03 -0500

1. There is no real restriction on watering from private wells in Raleigh and in northern Wake county -- just voluntary suggestions. It has been well publicized that some residences and business in Raleigh use well water for uses forbidden by the Raleigh water authority, such as irrigation, etc.-- many post signs stating they are using well water.
How does private well use by people serviced by the Raleigh water system affect the water supply of Acqua customers in northern Wake county?
How does private well use in northern Wake county affect the water supply of Acqua customers in northern Wake county?

2. If private well use impacts availability of Acqua customers, what plans does Acqua have to improve the situation?

3. For households in Wake County north of Strickland, does Acqua know how many days of water remain available? If not, how does Acqua plan to find out?

4. If the well water supply becomes insufficient in Northern Wake County, what plans does Acqua have to provide water? How long will it take to implement these plans?

5. What is the difference between an aquifer and the water that Acqua wells access?

6. How much of rain falling in the Falls Lake watershed area ends up in the lake, as opposed to ending up in the water accessed by Acqua wells?

7. Most Acqua customers in Northern Wake have septic systems. How much of the water that households send to the septic systems and use for hand-watering plants is returned to the well source? Except for water lost by evaporation from irrigation, how much irrigation water is returned to the well source?

8. How long does it take for rain water to make its way into the water source used by Acqua wells?

Lake Gaston

Greg Brown — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:06:06 -0500

A previous post commented on the fact that while Falls Lake is almost dry, other lakes including Jordan, Kerr, and Gaston were not nearly as low.

I would like to ask the question as to why Raleigh does not pursue a pipeline from Lake Gaston. North Carolina fought the state of Virginia and Virginia Beach for years in the courts over Virginia Beach's plan to pipe water from Gaston. For those who do not know, North Carolina lost that fight, and Virginia Beach now uses water from Lake Gaston. The big issue if I recall was removing the water from the Roanoke River Basin. That issue has been settled. If Virginia Beach can use that water, why can't Raleigh?

Ok, so what you are saying

Visitor — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 10:31:49 -0500

Ok, so what you are saying is that there are issues with Fall Lake. I agree, but that doesn't mean that 17% less than average rainfall is an "exceptional drought".

Average rainfall is just that - an average. Some years we'll get more (like 2006 we got 125%) and some years we'll get less (like 2007 we got 83%). The demand on Falls lake is simply exceeding the supply. Who's fault is that?

In addition...

Java55 — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 22:26:40 -0500

Falls Lake is supplied by a relatively small watershed as compared to Jordan Lake. If anyone has seen both the Haw River and the Neuse River this becomes readily apparent. It seems some adjustments in water allocations may be in order if those drawing water off Falls Lake are going to be allowed to continue development but in the same breath this topic could potentially become a very thorny issue.

re: "Exceptional" drought

Visitor — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 16:47:05 -0500

Visitor --

On average, Falls Lake is a very shallow lake, with a deep spot in the middle. So, if there are 10 "usable" feet of water in the lake, when you go down by one foot, you may have lost 20% of the capacity of the lake; another foot and you've lost 40%.

The other lakes you mentioned are both deeper and larger.

The net effect is that Falls lake is like a small cellphone battery -- it needs frequent recharging or it goes dry. Jordan lake is like a high-capacity battery that can handle only being plugged in every so often.

water restrictions

Visitor — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 12:20:07 -0500

We hear so much about residential water use, but Gov. Easley never seems to address non-residential use. I would like to know what the percentage of water use in the city of Raleigh is residential? If it is a small percentage then we residents can do all we can to reduce water consumption but may have little effect on the total use.

How can this be an "exceptional" drought?

Visitor — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 10:21:07 -0500

Based on the WRAL.com weather almanac data for Dec 31, 2007, we received 35.81 inches of precipitation for the year. Average is 43.05. Doing the math, we received 83.2% of average. The previous year, we received 125% of average.

Granted, 17% less rain than average could be considered a drought. But an "exceptional" drought? Seems rather mild to maybe moderate.

Clearly, Falls Lake is way below normal, and that is serous problem. But how come Jordan, Kerr, and Gaston lakes are all nearly full? Again based on the Lake Level data on WRAL.com, Kerr is 0.5 feet ABOVE normal, Jordan is 1.8 feet below, Gaston is 0.2 feet below, but Falls lake is a whopping 8.4 feet below normal.

Seems to me that there are just too many people using water from Falls lake due to over-development and selling water to surrounding communities. I can't believe that 17% less than normal precipitation creates "exceptional" drought conditions. Please comment. Thank you.

A couple of useful links

Java55 — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 17:09:50 -0500

After all this time I am surprised that noone has yet posted these links. Anyway they are well worth bookmarking.

North Carolina Drought Updates

North Carolina drought updates in real time

Weekly water use for cities and towns in North Carolina

There is some good up to date information here.

why don't we ever hear about....

plusaf — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 01:43:21 -0500

just sent this to the N&O Forum...

Two years ago, when I moved here, I wrote to the N&O’s Forum, asking why, with Falls Lake so low [yes, it was low then, too], nobody was discussing dredging it to increase its capacity.Now, it’s two years later, and had it been deepened and scoured out of tires, arrowheads and the like, it’s possible that today’s “remaining capacity” might be more like 180 days than 30 or 60.Well, that’s water over the… you know.The idea I’d like to bring to everyone’s attention now is that virtually every word that’s been used on TV or in print media has been about conservation. Conserve more, conserve more! We’re not conserving enough! We’re down 20% in consumption: that’s not enough! We’re down 40% in consumption: that’s not enough!And never heard is one little peep from anyone responsible for supplying our drinking water about anything anyone is doing to increase supply.In some sane world, when a commodity or natural resource becomes scarce, there are basically four ways to deal with it:

Learn to get by with less of it [today’s “plan”]
Raise the price to discourage over-use or waste [today’s “alternate plan”]
Move somewhere else where they don’t have the problem [not likely to be an acceptable solution for most of us who LIKE it here!]
Find more of it. [of which nobody speaks.]

Whether Solution Number Four involves desalination plants, interstate pipelines or cisterns in everyone’s back yard, it appalls me that the N&O and all of the other media outlets in this area seem to have given NO “air time” to any solutions other than the first three [actually, the first two.So, what’s wrong and why not? Enjoy http://www.plusaf.com/bluntconsulting/aquariusproject.htm for your consideration and amusement.

plusaf
Northwest Raleigh
27613

days left of water supply

Visitor — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 20:32:54 -0500

The Raleigh area depends on hurricanes and winter rains to fill the reservoirs.There have been no hurricanes this year and there is not enough rain in the long term forecast to sustain us. What are we to think, then, but that there is a disaster of epic proportions awaiting us come February or March.

Here is the scenario: On "Day 110", schools, businesses, hospitals, etc., will be closing; people will be streaming out of the city in a desperate search for water; there will be widespread civil unrest, and human suffering on a scale that we haven't seen since hurricane Katrina.

We think this cannot possibly happen to us; we've always had enough water. But the facts are staring us in the face.
When the water runs out, it's not as if we have motnhs or even weeks to find a solution. We can't last more than a few days without water.

We can hope and pray for rain, but in the meantime, we had better come up with a plan to deal with this potential catastrophe.

Drought questions

danbarkin — Sat, 10 Nov 2007 13:50:57 -0500

The historic drought afflicting North Carolina raises all sorts of questions about water, weather and our depleted reservoirs. Ask us your questions and we’ll find the answers. Post your questions here or send them to editor Richard Stradling at richard.stradling@newsobserver.com or at 215 S. McDowell St., Raleigh, NC 27601.

The historic drought afflicting North Carolina raises all sorts of questions about water, weather and our depleted reservoirs. Ask us your questions and we’ll find…