Category: Climate Change / Weather / Disasters

Everyone else is covering the impending hurricane strike on New Orleans in more detail, so there’s not much point in my doing so. I don’t have family or friends living there, but we have a lot of folks in my company in the NO area, and a major office in Baton Rouge. Thoughts and prayers extend that direction, regardless.

Earthquake here in Pasadena. Whee!

Building’s still rumbling a bit. Fun.

UPDATE: Looks like a 5.3 out by Yucaipa, 60-70 miles away. That feels awfully low for the amount of movement we had here (and I’m only on the 3rd floor).

UPDATE: News report (such as it currently is). Fox beat CNN to the punch.

UPDATE: BoingBoing coverage.

UPDATE: And I’m off the air, most likely, until Monday afternoon. By choice (vacation up where the WiFi don’t shine), not because California has fallen into the sea. 🙂

Or, at least, a lot more in the Denver area than there has been. Thus, an easing of watering restrictions from Denver Water:

• No time-per-zone restrictions.
• Customers will be “asked” to not water their lawns between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.

• Customers wil be asked to only water three days a week (broken out by odd-even addresses).

Assuming those requests are non-binding, I’ll have to see what makes most sense — an every-other day (3.5 waterings per week), 3-days but for longer periods, or whatever. We’ll see.

Good news, though.

Wow.

Drought-inspired conservation has reduced metro Denver’s water consumption to levels not seen since 1969, despite a 65 percent growth in the number of customers over that span.

Denver Water delivered just 59.4 billion gallons last year, 22.6 billion gallons fewer than the utility did before the onset of drought in 2000, new agency numbers show. “It’s astonishing,” Liz Gardener, Denver Water’s conservation manager, said of the 28 percent drop.

Similar savings have been noted in Aurora and Colorado Springs, the Front Range’s two other municipal giants.

Of course, fixed costs to the water utilities haven’t gone down by that much, meaning that water rates will continue to rise. And there’s some question — between summer water use surcharges and no-water days and a summer that ended up wetter than expected — how much of that drop will continue next year. But it’s still sort of remarkable — and promising, given that the population isn’t likely to drop any time soon …

I have enough correspondents in Florida that the nastiness which is the impending Hurricane Frances has me worried for them. Take care, folks — you’re in my thoughts and prayers.

(With a stray thought toward WDW and Cape Canaveral, too.)

Despite rains that (while were gone) brought June precipitation levels back up to normal, Denver Water won’t be easing restrictions.

Which is probably the right decision. Lives are not at stake here, and it’s better to be overly-conservative with watering restrictions than overly-liberal. And, no, that’s not a political statement …

Given the brighter water outlook, board members talked about adding a third watering day to the current two-day regimen because customers complain they have to cancel family trips so they can water on weekends.
Other customers say work schedules made it difficult to water on the correct days and during the limited hours.

I’m sure there are some limited number of people for whom that is a real issue. That’s how it goes, alas.

For the others, let me suggest the following ideas:

• Sprinkler timers.
• Hiring a local kid to come by and water for you during appropriate times/days.
• Xeriscaping. Or, at the very least, significantly reducing the amount of lawn you have in your yard (which has the most watering restrictions on it).

Okay, watering restrictions are a PitA, I’ll grant you that. There are certainly times when it would be more convenient for me for them not to be in place. But come on, guys — this was not all invented just to make your life difficult. It’s a growing part of reality here, and simply trying to ignore it isn’t going to solve it.

Man takes photos of lightning storm. Storm decides to reciprocate with lightning strike in his back yard. Man gets photo without realizing it.

(via BoingBoing)

That’s the estimated damage this week from thunderstorms and hail in Denver over the past week.

That doesn’t begin to reach the $625MM in insured damage from the 11 July 1990 hailstorm here (which is when our current house, and all the others in the neighborhood, got new roofs), but it’s a pretty amazing number.

On the other hand, it’s a great time to buy a car, slightly dented …

I’m sure it makes perfect economic sense. But it still feels screwy to see water rates go up. If it was because it was costing Denver Water more to get needed water in the face of the drought — well, nobody would question that. Instead, though, the problem is that:

1. There’s not enough water.
2. Denver Water is requiring mandatory conservation.
3. That reduces the amount of water DW sells.
4. That reduces DW’s revenue “stream.”
5. That means DW has to increase water fees to make up the shortfall.

See? Makes perfect sense.

Until you realize it means your water bill is going to go way up while your water consumption goes way down.

Yeesh.

As expected, Denver Water has imposed strict drought rules on its 1.2MM customers, effective 1 May.

For home lawn watering, folks are limited to two days per week (specified for odd vs. even addresses — we’ll be on a Sat/Wed schedule), an average of 15 minutes per sprinkler zone, but not from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Hefty fines await those who get caught doing otherwise.

Trees and shrubs can be handwatered on assigned days, but, again, not between 10 and 6. Flowers and vegetables can be hand-watered on any day except Monday, and not between 10 and 6.

With management, I think we can do that another year, but we’ll need to be careful. The tree sacks will be useful for the trees out front. A couple of tasks which need doing:

1. More mulch. Much more mulch.
2. Re-alligning some sprinkler heads to focus on flower beds.

Fewer plantings this year, alas, at least of smaller plants outside of pots. More hand-watering.

Margie’s suggested doing more drip irrigation out in the yard. I’m not convinced that’s the best way of handling things … but I’m not unconvinced, either.

Anyway, it gives me something to start acting on this weekend.

Despite a heavier-than-average April, we’re still running below normal (“normal” in the long view, that is), so we can expect further water restrictions this year in Denver.

The utility is expected to announce limits that will closely mirror the two-day per week mandatory watering schedule used last summer, along with surcharges for excess water use.
Cities such as Aurora and Colorado Springs have already announced strict two-day per week watering rules, a move designed to guard stored water supplies.
Statewide reservoirs are just 81 percent full and Denver Water, which has one of the largest municipal storage systems, said its reservoirs are only 72 percent full, about 10 percent below normal.

On the bright side, it’s not as bad (they say) as 2002.

“We need to be careful about how we characterize all of this,” Deputy State Engineer Jack Byers said. “This isn’t as bad as 2002.” For example, back then, the April 1 snowpack measured just 52 percent of average and dropped to just 19 percent of average by May 1, he said. In contrast, this year’s April 1 reading recorded 65 percent of average.
But weather forecasts offer mixed signals and little outlook for more relief, said Klaus Wolter, a forecaster with the Climate Diagnostics Center in Boulder. “In the next 14 days, we’re likely to lose some ground. Let’s just hope it doesn’t get too hot,” Wolter said.

Amen.

After all the attention being given to the California fires — including sending some of our firefighters and equipment out that way — it’s only ironic justice that we’d end up with a couple of fires of our own here in the Denver area. There’s some bad stuff going on up in the canyons above Boulder. Closer to home, there’s a fire amongst the Big Houses in the Castle Pines area (home of the International).

Both fires are being exacerbated by Chinook winds blowing through ahead of a cold front. They should die down by mid-tomorrow, and if we get the wet that’s promised, that should help, too.

Nothing much more to say about them. They’re not nearly the devasators of Southern California, though that’s small comfort to those who have already lost their homes. Though the southern fire is about 5-10 miles away, we’re in no danger here — though there’s more than a whiff of smoke in the air.

Joseph Urbaszewski’s blog is tracking TV, scanner, and other misc. info on the San Bernardino portions of the SoCal fires. Good stuff. There’s also more information on those fires on this new official site.

And another really cool satellite photo here.

Mary made a good point below, so I’ll repeat it up here in a main entry.

If you want to donate to the American Red Cross, who are assisting in helping families displaced by the Southern California fires, you can do so on-line (specify the Disaster Relief Fund).

You can also go to the San Diego/Imperial County Red Cross pages and donate there.

Other donation links can be found here and here.