A modest suggestion for solving instream flow challenges
The Department of Ecology is making a rule for instream flows in WRIA 17. That's no secret. They are under the impression that they need to include some severe restrictions on future water withdrawals, even though we are using only 4% of the almost 46 trillion gallons of annual recharge in the watershed. The restrictions aren't a secret either, but we thought you'd like to know just how much water we're talking about. (That figure does not include the surface water flowing into saltwater bodies, by the way.)
Salmon do, of course, deserve to have enough water available to be viable through their various freshwater life stages, and that's what the instream flow is supposed to be all about. Will restricting newcomers to watering only 1/12 (one-twelfth) of an acre and a maximum daily household use of 350 gallons do the trick? Not likely. If the instream flows are supposedly too low at critical times of the year now, and if current water rights aren't going to be affected, how will seizure of all unappropriated water in the watershed and strict rationing make things any better?
Now, it's one thing to voice our concerns about this, but that doesn't do much to really solve the perceived problem. We need a solution that will actually help make things better. What might that look like?
Since Ecology is the agency that wants to fix this so badly, perhaps Ecology should put together a real solution, rather than simply grabbing ownership of and control over our water resources? What a concept!
Ecology is willing to allow the Big Quilcene River and Chimacum Creek to remain open for water withdrawals for a few months a year. One of the purposes of this interruptible supply is storage. How about if the Department of Ecology builds a partnership with the Departments of Natural Resources and Fish and Wildlife to build reservoirs specifically for the purpose of managing instream flows throughout the year? If these folks are going to take the role of guardians of our fish populations, perhaps they should provide a real solution instead of putting the load on the backs of the people who want to live in this spectacular part of the world.
I know that one of the objections to this will be that the water would warm up, perhaps enough to be harmful to the fish. Since the water withdrawal from the water storage would be at the bottom of its lowest point, though, this should not be a significant issue, since the coolest water of the lake would be at the bottom.
Another objection would be the expense of building the reservoirs. So, what's so bad about asking the state to put its money where its mouth is? Shouldn't all of Washington's residents share the burden of protecting the fish instead of just the people who want to build a rural lifestyle in the county? If the reservoirs are built on the plentiful DNR lands we have here, the timber harvested to make room for the lakes would pay a large portion of the building and operations costs. The burden on the individual taxpayer would then be actually rather light.
There's no provision for doing this in state law, you say? Well, the legislature wrote and passed the law that's being used to take over WRIA 17's water now, right? So the legislature can pass the enabling legislation that would make it possible for Ecology and its partners to build and manage the infrastructure resources to play with instream flows to their hearts' content for generations of both fish and bureaucrats.
Worried about high operations and maintenance funding needs? Chances are those needs would be much lower than the funding needs to operate the huge corps of water cops Ecology will be needing to police their water use regimen once they get it put into place in all 62 WRIAs in the state.
Either we allow Ecology to move forward with seizing the unappropriated water and rationing it back to future users, or we push them toward a more useful and practical solution to the instream flow problem they believe exists. If they are so wise as to what our fish need flowing down our streams in any given month or two week period, then perhaps they should develop a solution that will actually reliably provide the exact flows, rather than leaving them to chance.
How about it? They're telling us they want our suggestions ... should this be the one we push?
Salmon do, of course, deserve to have enough water available to be viable through their various freshwater life stages, and that's what the instream flow is supposed to be all about. Will restricting newcomers to watering only 1/12 (one-twelfth) of an acre and a maximum daily household use of 350 gallons do the trick? Not likely. If the instream flows are supposedly too low at critical times of the year now, and if current water rights aren't going to be affected, how will seizure of all unappropriated water in the watershed and strict rationing make things any better?
Now, it's one thing to voice our concerns about this, but that doesn't do much to really solve the perceived problem. We need a solution that will actually help make things better. What might that look like?
Since Ecology is the agency that wants to fix this so badly, perhaps Ecology should put together a real solution, rather than simply grabbing ownership of and control over our water resources? What a concept!
Ecology is willing to allow the Big Quilcene River and Chimacum Creek to remain open for water withdrawals for a few months a year. One of the purposes of this interruptible supply is storage. How about if the Department of Ecology builds a partnership with the Departments of Natural Resources and Fish and Wildlife to build reservoirs specifically for the purpose of managing instream flows throughout the year? If these folks are going to take the role of guardians of our fish populations, perhaps they should provide a real solution instead of putting the load on the backs of the people who want to live in this spectacular part of the world.
I know that one of the objections to this will be that the water would warm up, perhaps enough to be harmful to the fish. Since the water withdrawal from the water storage would be at the bottom of its lowest point, though, this should not be a significant issue, since the coolest water of the lake would be at the bottom.
Another objection would be the expense of building the reservoirs. So, what's so bad about asking the state to put its money where its mouth is? Shouldn't all of Washington's residents share the burden of protecting the fish instead of just the people who want to build a rural lifestyle in the county? If the reservoirs are built on the plentiful DNR lands we have here, the timber harvested to make room for the lakes would pay a large portion of the building and operations costs. The burden on the individual taxpayer would then be actually rather light.
There's no provision for doing this in state law, you say? Well, the legislature wrote and passed the law that's being used to take over WRIA 17's water now, right? So the legislature can pass the enabling legislation that would make it possible for Ecology and its partners to build and manage the infrastructure resources to play with instream flows to their hearts' content for generations of both fish and bureaucrats.
Worried about high operations and maintenance funding needs? Chances are those needs would be much lower than the funding needs to operate the huge corps of water cops Ecology will be needing to police their water use regimen once they get it put into place in all 62 WRIAs in the state.
Either we allow Ecology to move forward with seizing the unappropriated water and rationing it back to future users, or we push them toward a more useful and practical solution to the instream flow problem they believe exists. If they are so wise as to what our fish need flowing down our streams in any given month or two week period, then perhaps they should develop a solution that will actually reliably provide the exact flows, rather than leaving them to chance.
How about it? They're telling us they want our suggestions ... should this be the one we push?
posted by olyfarm @ 11:38 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
If the real objective is to maintain minimum instream flows, then this may be a much more focused (and politically acceptable) approach than Ecology's current approach of uber-management of all water use.
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