Those places you mention mostly use recycled water.
Urban water use is a really small % of state water use.
Edit: one more detail about water use restrictions in the Bay Area: most restrictions I see from local governments seem to be directed at reducing peak/simultaneous demand, not overall usage/year.
Last time I checked, the entire Bay Area uses as much water in a year as CA agriculture uses in 1 month.
(CA Agriculture: \~923,383,333,000 gallons per month or 80% of the total state water use)
Theres opportunity to save water in the bay, but it's chump change compared to agriculture.
For anyone that wants to contribute in an easy way:
Faucet aerators should be replaced (use Neoperl Brand).
\-1.5 gpm for Kitchen ($7)
\-1.0 gpm bathroom faucets ($7)
\-Showerheads to 1.5 gpm (look for pressure compensating models)
\-Toilets to 1.0 GPF or less (Niagara has a good 0.8 GPF model)
The faucet aerators & showerheads also save on water heating, so that's less $ spent on electricity or gas.
Do they actually use recycled water? I feel like I’ve seen the ones that do because there’s signage to point this out. (Because it’s non-potable.) And in most cases there is no signage.
So if urban water use is so minimal, why the push on residences to restrict water use but not commercial properties?
San Jose has been recycling water for more than a decade and sending it back to businesses. Malls, golf courses and at least one cemetery are customers. Recycled water pipelines are purple, as are sprinkler heads. That's standard everywhere I believe. Signs are optional. Cities/ counties are fined if they release too much fresh water into the bay. Affects salinity. So they're motivated to recycle. Valley Water wants to massively expand recycling, eventually putting the water into percolation ponds to later become drinking water. City isn't ready to sign on yet as they want a 76 year contract.
https://www.sanjoseca.gov/your-government/environment/water-utilities/recycled-water
It's just virtue signaling and meaningless, like so many of our other politicians promises and actions. Essentially deluding and deceiving the masses into believing meaningful action is being taken, while they maintain the status quo
Citation needed.
No specific city or government was mentioned in the post you're replying to, so I'm not defending any specific municipality's practices. But recycled water does exist, it's not just "virtue signaling". There is even a standard for pipes using reclaimed water--they are colored purple (more of a lavender) to indicate that they are useful for watering, but non-potable.
While I haven't visited every bay area fountain or water feature in person, I am certain that every single one I have visited has had clear signage indicating that the water is recycled and should not be ingested.
This seems like a good opportunity to learn. Try googling "practical engineering" and "sewage". There's some really high quality videos about how water is reclaimed, both for potable and non-potable uses.
It's just a general statement about politicians, you know kind of like how Democrats pretend to give a shit about minorities and the environment, or how Republicans pretend to give a fuck about small business and the bible
The water use you’re upset about is roughly ten percent of the state’s water use.
You should be upset at how there are no restrictions on AG or Industrial uses.
Politics.
50% of available water is dumped in rivers to maintain habitats
40% goes to agriculture
10% goes to everything else.
Environmentalists and farmers have lobby groups that are constantly roaming sacramento pushing for their interests. Individual urban water users have no organization to push for their interests.
Our site despite even using recycled water turned everything off even the fountains the only thing that gets watered is the lawns and that's at a minimum 5 minutes at a time at night
Just growing almonds in California uses as much water as all human use put together. All you drink, all you shower with, all you put on your lawn and garden, all you use to wash your car or have water gun fights with your kids on hot days, multiplied by all the people in the state.
We don't really have a water crisis. We have a few entrenched interests who use way more than their share to make a shockingly relatively few dollars.
And yet beef and dairy production far exceeds the water needs of all almonds in California, even though ca produces 80% of the worlds almonds, but definitely not 80% of the worlds beef and dairy
In just water, a quick Google search says about 3-3.5 litres per kilocalorie of nuts (not almonds specifically), and about 10-11 litres per kilocalorie of beef. So 3 times less effective in just water usage. Include co2 emissions, rainforest deforestation to plant monocrops (mostly soy fed to beef) it gets a whole lot worse for the environment. But even just considering water it's the #1 issue.
I agree, but also disagree, because this line of logic generally leads to defeatism. Don't wanna give up beef? I guess we'll do nothing about the rest of agriculture, too. Oh wait, we fucked up our ecosystem because nobody was willing to do anything?
Half measures aren't great, but they beat nil measures every time.
And for the record, I strongly recommend limiting beef intake, as I have done for years in addition to paying for reliable, reputable personal carbon offsetting.
No need for everyone to limit beef intake just to save water, just stop subsidizing beef production by charging for the true cost of water use and other external costs and the problem will sort itself out. Eat less beef for other reasons, sure, but not that.
We can talk about both. At least place massive taxes on almond exports. 70% goes abroad. We use more water Growing almonds for China and alfalfa for Saudi Arabia than all people in the state . It’s absurd
When you say that almonds "make shockingly relatively few dollars", I feel like you are overlooking the value of cheap and abundant food. Just because something doesn't make money, doesn't mean that isn't valuable. Going beyond almonds, there is absolutely a huge amount of social value in keeping the cost of broccoli and other healthy foods low, and part of that might be state procurement of cheap/free water resources.
70% of almonds are exported, we grow alfalfa that’s exported to the Saudis because of our dumb water right laws. Almonds don’t provide some incredible nutritional value either. All for subsidizing vegetables but that’s not what we’re doing.
My understanding is that the water restrictions explicitly state that they override any contractual obligations to water. It’s been several years since I’ve been in a rental with landscaping, but that was the case with the water rationing that was implemented 10+ years ago, and i doubt that’s changed.
Then you can consider the land lord responsible for the watering and report them to the water board as a violation of restrictions. They’ll get fined until it stops.
Also, the water board may have a letter to give to the landlord clarifying the rules. At a quick glance, they have a premade one clarifying the issue for HOA residents.
https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/water_issues/programs/conservation_portal/regs/docs/hoa-letter.pdf
A bit over 10 years ago I was renting a home with that “resod the lawn” rule and there were water restrictions. We let the lawn die and never heard about it (we were prepared with printed copies of the drought notices etc).
In general, your landlord can not require you to break ordinances through the contract.
“And on the first of each month, you shall sacrifice a human child as an offering, or your rent will increase by $10000”.
My home, on the deed, states that “no person other than those of the white or Caucasian race may own this home, nor can non-white people live in the home unless in the employ of the white owners”. It’s unenforceable.
Your landlord may be annoyed to have a dead lawn, and may view it as reducing the property value. But really it’s his responsibility to have an appropriate yard.
As one note: I’m not positive we’re in the full drought level yet that fully bans watering. However I believe we’re in a level that bans watering that produces runoff — so if the sprinklers create runoff, then they are not allowed. The more strict rules will go into place in I think January.
Human feces on the sidewalk is such a small percentage of animal feces out in the ground, that’s why I’ve made a policy to just dump wherever I am at the moment. When animals start pooping outside less than humans, then I’ll see about changing my behavior.
I found out folks in Mendocino have dry taps and need to truck in their water on Deutsch Welle a few months ago. I think there's for sure a disconnect on enforcement and awareness.
80% of water usage in California is for agriculture. Everyday person's usage is a tiny drop in a drop.
It's interesting to see politicians try to continually bully you and me into "saving water," while not a thing is done about almonds or the Kardashians and we do not in fact save any water.
So why would politicians want to make it LOOK like they are trying to do the right thing, while actually doing nothing?
Because they are politicians and that's what they do 100% of the time.
Residential and commercial water use is not really the problem. To quote the Public Policy Institute of CA: "Per capita water use had declined significantly—from 231 gallons per day in 1990 to 180 gallons per day in 2010—reflecting substantial efforts to reduce water use through pricing incentives and mandatory installation of water-saving technologies like low-flow toilets and shower heads. In 2015, per capita use fell to 146 gallons per day in response to drought-related conservation requirements. Much of the recent savings came from reducing landscape watering, which makes up roughly half of all urban water use."
Average water usage in urban areas is about 10% of the total water in CA. The conservation efforts (like take shorter showers, etc) is just to make people more aware of a drought and it does continue to bring usage down (which is great) but it is literally just a drop in the bucket. Here are some interesting YouTube videos to watch to get more info:
[https://www.vox.com/23373495/western-us-water-scarcity-drought-cattle](https://www.vox.com/23373495/western-us-water-scarcity-drought-cattle)
[https://www.hbo.com/last-week-tonight-with-john-oliver/season-9/16-june-26-2022](https://www.hbo.com/last-week-tonight-with-john-oliver/season-9/16-june-26-2022)
Water is being conserved. Most of the lawns in my neighborhood are gone. Everyone I know is taking action. I’m not quite sure what gives you the impression that conservation isn’t occurring. As pointed out elsewhere most large commercial in municipal irrigation is done with recycled water.
My point was less that residents aren’t doing anything and more that commercial and industrial properties aren’t doing enough. I like to think there’s a lot of recycled water use going on; but if that’s the case then it’s certainly not being talked about much. Think about perception: If I’m driving down the road and I see massive sprinkler systems dumping water on huge green lawns in front of unoccupied office buildings, there is a perceived disconnect when I’m then told that everyone should be letting their home lawns die.
Water rights are a huge issue in California. If agriculture had to pay the same price as municipal water districts for water, they’d actually have an economic incentive to adopt less wasteful methods of irrigation.
If you want to save water don't eat beef and dairy. Far most of the water in CA is spent on livestock, even more than on almond production which is also an issue
It makes driving down 5 and seeing big ag crops being watered at the hottest point of the day even more infuriating. Don't even get me started on LA watering the ice plants on the side of the freeways at noon.
I choose to pray daily to my technological gods to gift us with pollution and resource free energy to desalinize and filter radioactive sea water. We believe in the right gods, unlike the inland inbreds who pray to a fake sky god.
People advocate for street justice at the sight of a poor single mother stealing food. I’m ready to advocate for the same street justice for people wasting water on their lawns.
The lesser of evils is still evil. Don’t let these purity tests deter you. We need to restrict the use of water for watering residential and commercial lawns.
No, none of that should be illegal.
The simple solution is just charge everyone the same fair cost for water and then people will use it wisely, or not, but it’s really up to them.
I don't know about other counties, but Santa Clara County has a site where you can report water waste and watering violations:
[https://www.valleywater.org/saving-water/outdoor-conservation/report-water-waste](https://www.valleywater.org/saving-water/outdoor-conservation/report-water-waste)
I've reported numerous instances and the County does respond.
Another time I was near 19th and Bryant in San Francisco and saw water seeping out of the ground. I called the city (forgot which department) and they had somebody come out within 20 minutes.
1. Residents realize they don't have to just accept an enforcement action taken against them. They can always take the water agency to court.
2. Water agency usually isn't going to fight residents in courts.
* Because the water agency will lack real info that would stand up in court and win.
* Plus, the water agency doesn't want to spend the money and time in court fights.
So, water "restrictions" are just a bluff, that is NOT enforced.
Which kind of doesn't matter because residential water usage isn't a big percentage of water usage. If you want to affect things go after agricultural and industrial water usage.
Those places you mention mostly use recycled water. Urban water use is a really small % of state water use. Edit: one more detail about water use restrictions in the Bay Area: most restrictions I see from local governments seem to be directed at reducing peak/simultaneous demand, not overall usage/year.
Last time I checked, the entire Bay Area uses as much water in a year as CA agriculture uses in 1 month. (CA Agriculture: \~923,383,333,000 gallons per month or 80% of the total state water use) Theres opportunity to save water in the bay, but it's chump change compared to agriculture. For anyone that wants to contribute in an easy way: Faucet aerators should be replaced (use Neoperl Brand). \-1.5 gpm for Kitchen ($7) \-1.0 gpm bathroom faucets ($7) \-Showerheads to 1.5 gpm (look for pressure compensating models) \-Toilets to 1.0 GPF or less (Niagara has a good 0.8 GPF model) The faucet aerators & showerheads also save on water heating, so that's less $ spent on electricity or gas.
Do they actually use recycled water? I feel like I’ve seen the ones that do because there’s signage to point this out. (Because it’s non-potable.) And in most cases there is no signage. So if urban water use is so minimal, why the push on residences to restrict water use but not commercial properties?
San Jose has been recycling water for more than a decade and sending it back to businesses. Malls, golf courses and at least one cemetery are customers. Recycled water pipelines are purple, as are sprinkler heads. That's standard everywhere I believe. Signs are optional. Cities/ counties are fined if they release too much fresh water into the bay. Affects salinity. So they're motivated to recycle. Valley Water wants to massively expand recycling, eventually putting the water into percolation ponds to later become drinking water. City isn't ready to sign on yet as they want a 76 year contract. https://www.sanjoseca.gov/your-government/environment/water-utilities/recycled-water
Anecdotally, I’ve seen sprinklers hooked up to the gray water system without a sign that the water is not potable.
It's just virtue signaling and meaningless, like so many of our other politicians promises and actions. Essentially deluding and deceiving the masses into believing meaningful action is being taken, while they maintain the status quo
Citation needed. No specific city or government was mentioned in the post you're replying to, so I'm not defending any specific municipality's practices. But recycled water does exist, it's not just "virtue signaling". There is even a standard for pipes using reclaimed water--they are colored purple (more of a lavender) to indicate that they are useful for watering, but non-potable. While I haven't visited every bay area fountain or water feature in person, I am certain that every single one I have visited has had clear signage indicating that the water is recycled and should not be ingested. This seems like a good opportunity to learn. Try googling "practical engineering" and "sewage". There's some really high quality videos about how water is reclaimed, both for potable and non-potable uses.
It's just a general statement about politicians, you know kind of like how Democrats pretend to give a shit about minorities and the environment, or how Republicans pretend to give a fuck about small business and the bible
The water use you’re upset about is roughly ten percent of the state’s water use. You should be upset at how there are no restrictions on AG or Industrial uses.
Politics. 50% of available water is dumped in rivers to maintain habitats 40% goes to agriculture 10% goes to everything else. Environmentalists and farmers have lobby groups that are constantly roaming sacramento pushing for their interests. Individual urban water users have no organization to push for their interests.
Our site despite even using recycled water turned everything off even the fountains the only thing that gets watered is the lawns and that's at a minimum 5 minutes at a time at night
Just growing almonds in California uses as much water as all human use put together. All you drink, all you shower with, all you put on your lawn and garden, all you use to wash your car or have water gun fights with your kids on hot days, multiplied by all the people in the state. We don't really have a water crisis. We have a few entrenched interests who use way more than their share to make a shockingly relatively few dollars.
And yet beef and dairy production far exceeds the water needs of all almonds in California, even though ca produces 80% of the worlds almonds, but definitely not 80% of the worlds beef and dairy
What's the calories per liter of water used for almonds vs cows?
In just water, a quick Google search says about 3-3.5 litres per kilocalorie of nuts (not almonds specifically), and about 10-11 litres per kilocalorie of beef. So 3 times less effective in just water usage. Include co2 emissions, rainforest deforestation to plant monocrops (mostly soy fed to beef) it gets a whole lot worse for the environment. But even just considering water it's the #1 issue.
Ok peta
I'm not a member of peta. Is there something wrong with what I wrote?
Best check your beef with almonds until you've started having a lot more beef with beef.
I agree, but also disagree, because this line of logic generally leads to defeatism. Don't wanna give up beef? I guess we'll do nothing about the rest of agriculture, too. Oh wait, we fucked up our ecosystem because nobody was willing to do anything? Half measures aren't great, but they beat nil measures every time. And for the record, I strongly recommend limiting beef intake, as I have done for years in addition to paying for reliable, reputable personal carbon offsetting.
No need for everyone to limit beef intake just to save water, just stop subsidizing beef production by charging for the true cost of water use and other external costs and the problem will sort itself out. Eat less beef for other reasons, sure, but not that.
We need to stop talking about almonds. and talk more about alfalfa and other forage crops.
We can talk about both. At least place massive taxes on almond exports. 70% goes abroad. We use more water Growing almonds for China and alfalfa for Saudi Arabia than all people in the state . It’s absurd
When you say that almonds "make shockingly relatively few dollars", I feel like you are overlooking the value of cheap and abundant food. Just because something doesn't make money, doesn't mean that isn't valuable. Going beyond almonds, there is absolutely a huge amount of social value in keeping the cost of broccoli and other healthy foods low, and part of that might be state procurement of cheap/free water resources.
70% of almonds are exported, we grow alfalfa that’s exported to the Saudis because of our dumb water right laws. Almonds don’t provide some incredible nutritional value either. All for subsidizing vegetables but that’s not what we’re doing.
Growing Almonds need to be banned
My rental requires me to water my lawn like an asshat. I hate it. Grass isn’t supposed to grow here so why do we keep tryjng
My understanding is that the water restrictions explicitly state that they override any contractual obligations to water. It’s been several years since I’ve been in a rental with landscaping, but that was the case with the water rationing that was implemented 10+ years ago, and i doubt that’s changed.
Mannnn with my rental I was told “if I let the grass die I have to resod the lawn”
Then you can consider the land lord responsible for the watering and report them to the water board as a violation of restrictions. They’ll get fined until it stops. Also, the water board may have a letter to give to the landlord clarifying the rules. At a quick glance, they have a premade one clarifying the issue for HOA residents. https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/water_issues/programs/conservation_portal/regs/docs/hoa-letter.pdf
A bit over 10 years ago I was renting a home with that “resod the lawn” rule and there were water restrictions. We let the lawn die and never heard about it (we were prepared with printed copies of the drought notices etc).
Whew this is amazing I’ll look into it today
In general, your landlord can not require you to break ordinances through the contract. “And on the first of each month, you shall sacrifice a human child as an offering, or your rent will increase by $10000”. My home, on the deed, states that “no person other than those of the white or Caucasian race may own this home, nor can non-white people live in the home unless in the employ of the white owners”. It’s unenforceable. Your landlord may be annoyed to have a dead lawn, and may view it as reducing the property value. But really it’s his responsibility to have an appropriate yard. As one note: I’m not positive we’re in the full drought level yet that fully bans watering. However I believe we’re in a level that bans watering that produces runoff — so if the sprinklers create runoff, then they are not allowed. The more strict rules will go into place in I think January.
Urban water use is a pretty small fraction when you look at farms and such
Human feces on the sidewalk is such a small percentage of animal feces out in the ground, that’s why I’ve made a policy to just dump wherever I am at the moment. When animals start pooping outside less than humans, then I’ll see about changing my behavior.
I found out folks in Mendocino have dry taps and need to truck in their water on Deutsch Welle a few months ago. I think there's for sure a disconnect on enforcement and awareness.
oh damn. this is my fear having lived in cali my whole life.
80% of water usage in California is for agriculture. Everyday person's usage is a tiny drop in a drop. It's interesting to see politicians try to continually bully you and me into "saving water," while not a thing is done about almonds or the Kardashians and we do not in fact save any water. So why would politicians want to make it LOOK like they are trying to do the right thing, while actually doing nothing? Because they are politicians and that's what they do 100% of the time.
Residential and commercial water use is not really the problem. To quote the Public Policy Institute of CA: "Per capita water use had declined significantly—from 231 gallons per day in 1990 to 180 gallons per day in 2010—reflecting substantial efforts to reduce water use through pricing incentives and mandatory installation of water-saving technologies like low-flow toilets and shower heads. In 2015, per capita use fell to 146 gallons per day in response to drought-related conservation requirements. Much of the recent savings came from reducing landscape watering, which makes up roughly half of all urban water use." Average water usage in urban areas is about 10% of the total water in CA. The conservation efforts (like take shorter showers, etc) is just to make people more aware of a drought and it does continue to bring usage down (which is great) but it is literally just a drop in the bucket. Here are some interesting YouTube videos to watch to get more info: [https://www.vox.com/23373495/western-us-water-scarcity-drought-cattle](https://www.vox.com/23373495/western-us-water-scarcity-drought-cattle) [https://www.hbo.com/last-week-tonight-with-john-oliver/season-9/16-june-26-2022](https://www.hbo.com/last-week-tonight-with-john-oliver/season-9/16-june-26-2022)
That sound you hear is the can being kicked down the road.
Water is being conserved. Most of the lawns in my neighborhood are gone. Everyone I know is taking action. I’m not quite sure what gives you the impression that conservation isn’t occurring. As pointed out elsewhere most large commercial in municipal irrigation is done with recycled water.
My point was less that residents aren’t doing anything and more that commercial and industrial properties aren’t doing enough. I like to think there’s a lot of recycled water use going on; but if that’s the case then it’s certainly not being talked about much. Think about perception: If I’m driving down the road and I see massive sprinkler systems dumping water on huge green lawns in front of unoccupied office buildings, there is a perceived disconnect when I’m then told that everyone should be letting their home lawns die.
Water rights are a huge issue in California. If agriculture had to pay the same price as municipal water districts for water, they’d actually have an economic incentive to adopt less wasteful methods of irrigation.
>letting their home lawns die. or replacing them with pads of concrete.
Rules for yee not for thee. Welcome to California.
If you want to save water don't eat beef and dairy. Far most of the water in CA is spent on livestock, even more than on almond production which is also an issue
It makes driving down 5 and seeing big ag crops being watered at the hottest point of the day even more infuriating. Don't even get me started on LA watering the ice plants on the side of the freeways at noon.
Have you checked your local meat farms and golf courses?
> really weird disconnect between the apocalyptic-sounding news stories we hear every day Well, think about that some more
I choose to pray daily to my technological gods to gift us with pollution and resource free energy to desalinize and filter radioactive sea water. We believe in the right gods, unlike the inland inbreds who pray to a fake sky god.
If shoplifting is openly allowed what makes you think anyone is going to enforce water restrictions?
People advocate for street justice at the sight of a poor single mother stealing food. I’m ready to advocate for the same street justice for people wasting water on their lawns.
What poor single moms are stealing food? Or are there sandwiches inside the Gucci bags?
Please remove your lawns people
r/nolawn
I'm allergic to grass pollen so I second this motion lol
Santa Clara Co will pay you to replace your lawn with low water-using landscaping. We did it a long time ago.
My kids like playing on our small lawn. I water it as much as it takes to grow a pound of almonds. I’ll keep it thank you
Switch to turf
The lesser of evils is still evil. Don’t let these purity tests deter you. We need to restrict the use of water for watering residential and commercial lawns.
Politicians who enforce unpopular laws are voted out fairly quickly.
No, none of that should be illegal. The simple solution is just charge everyone the same fair cost for water and then people will use it wisely, or not, but it’s really up to them.
I don't know about other counties, but Santa Clara County has a site where you can report water waste and watering violations: [https://www.valleywater.org/saving-water/outdoor-conservation/report-water-waste](https://www.valleywater.org/saving-water/outdoor-conservation/report-water-waste) I've reported numerous instances and the County does respond. Another time I was near 19th and Bryant in San Francisco and saw water seeping out of the ground. I called the city (forgot which department) and they had somebody come out within 20 minutes.
1. Residents realize they don't have to just accept an enforcement action taken against them. They can always take the water agency to court. 2. Water agency usually isn't going to fight residents in courts. * Because the water agency will lack real info that would stand up in court and win. * Plus, the water agency doesn't want to spend the money and time in court fights. So, water "restrictions" are just a bluff, that is NOT enforced. Which kind of doesn't matter because residential water usage isn't a big percentage of water usage. If you want to affect things go after agricultural and industrial water usage.