Foundation urges smarter water use

Utah's strong population growth and the state's ongoing, six-year drought are reasons to be concerned about future water availability, according to the Utah Foundation.

Increased population over the period 1990-2000 "raises concerns about demands outstripping supply even when drought conditions don't exist," said the foundation's research report, "Utah's Water Situation." The report by the nonprofit, non-advocacy research group is posted on the Internet at www.utahfoundation.org.

According to the foundation, the present drought is the worst for the Wasatch Front since the dust bowl era of the 1930s. And for much of the rest of Utah, it's the worst in a century.

A chart in the report shows that in 2000, Utah had the second-highest, per-capita use of municipal and industrial water among all states, with only Nevada using more. Utah's use was 293 gallons per capita in the second year of the present drought. By comparison, the national average was 193 gallons while that of the Mountain West region was 256.

Foundation executive director Stephen Kroes said that is not surprising.

"The states that have low rainfall in the summer are the states that have high water use per capita," he said.

The residents tend to use more water to green up their lawns than would people living in a moist environment.

Is that practice a mistake?

"I would not call it a mistake," Kroes said, "but we need to be smarter about it, probably. Most of us water our lawns too much."

Meanwhile, size of home lots has a bearing on how much water a home uses. Salt Lake City tends to have smaller lots. Compared to the rest of the Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District, which wholesales water to Utah's capital city, "There is less water being used in Salt Lake City per capita than in the rest of the valley," Kroes said.

Land-use planning that would create smaller lots with the intention of saving water might not work unless it was done carefully.

"If we develop communities with smaller lot sizes, we are going to be more dense," he said. "Having more households might offset the savings."

If communities made a significant commitment for open space, which would not need as much water, that might contribute toward savings on water, Kroes suggested.

Drought has impacted all of Utah's river basins. A "weighted drought index" for the entire state shows that in some areas, the 1990 drought was more severe than the present one was in 2002, the most recent year for which figures are available.