I'm lucky that I live where there is an abundance of fresh clean water (wettest spot on earth, most years) but on a nearby island, there is a shortage of clean drinking water due to a navy fuel spill rendering the water unusable for a large portion of the island. Now they are thinking of building a 2nd artificial wave pool (for when surfing isn't good on the island) using up 7 million gallons of water and it's being met with controversy. Fresh clean drinking water is a luxury, yet also a necessity and not everyone is lucky enough to have access to healthy water. Definitely something to keep an eye on for the future!
How common is rain harvesting? Here it has become mandatory for some newly developed places.
@jackjr I don't know. We have reservoirs in strategic places, on my island, but that's about all I know. There are diversions to the fresh water streams that are contested by various entities, but not really a lot of controversy as we are pretty water rich.
I don't follow it too closely, as my water comes from a faucet and I pay my bills on time. The agriculture folks seem to have it handled pretty well at least on my island. I don't follow the news on the other islands, with perhaps more dry areas, all that closely.
@Julie808 As you may know Seattle has some of the best water i the country. It comes from two watersheds, the Cedar and Tolt Rivers. On our island archipelago most come from wells. There are some fools building de-sal systems which use a ton of energy. More and more people living along the shores are getting salt water intrusion in their wells. The big problem is what's known as recharge rate. Lopez has the best at 9+%. That means for every ten gallons of rain only 1 gallon makes it to the well. We don't have reservoirs and do all our individually.
@jackjr As a child in West Seattle, I lived right below the water towers and the reservoir on 35th Ave SW and Willow Street. My mom always complained that our water pressure was low because we were too close to the towers, living on the highest hill of all of Seattle. (Gatewood Hill) Our water always tasted good though.
Here too on Kauai, the water is delicious right out of the tap. Not so in other parts of the country, where the water tastes nasty. We have reservoirs here, for irrigations I think mostly. I don't know what some folks do who live out away from the main infrustructure. They might very well have rain barrels and such. I admit I don't know much except what is directly around me.
@Julie808 Seems we talked about this before. I lived on 35th Ave SW and Kenyon, near the towers. Our water was also great.There was once an article in the paper about how a huge reservoir was dug under the towers. My well water is OK but very hard with a lot of iron (good for the body, though). The harvesting system has two filters and an U/V sterilizer. The water is pure H2O. Our pressure in W. Seattle was normal.
Did you know about Camp Long? it was located at the top of the hill from the W. Seattle Freeway. Was originally a part of the W. Seattle golf course.
@jackjr Camp Long was down the hill from me. Yes, I loved that place! The West Seattle Golf Course is where I got my first marriage proposal, haha, didn't marry him, but it was nice to be asked!
I'm sure you also know about Hamilton Viewpoint, with a view of the skyline, and was a popular "necking" spot. I didn't go there for that, but in later years, actually performed a wedding there, and my sister had her wedding photos there too. I performed some weddings at the Alki Beach Bathhouse too. So many things to love about West Seattle. Mmm... Spuds Fish and Chips!
From my front yard as a kid, we had a great view of the Ivar's fireworks show. The "4th of Jul-Ivars" we called it, haha!
I can't imagine how much the US uses. I love water, I drink about a gallon of ice cold water every day.