ARLINGTON The city of Arlington is on track to meet city and state standards for the efficiency of water use, according to city of Arlington Public Works Director Len Olive.
The Washington State Department of Health developed Water Use Efficiency requirements for utilities effective Jan. 22, 2007. Of these WUE requirements, Olive explained that the city was already compliant in installing both production and service meters, as well as collecting consumption and production data. The city has also met the WUE requirements of including a WUE program in its planning documents and meeting a 10 percent leakage standard.##M:[more]#
Of the remaining WUE requirements, Olive predicted that the city would be able to fully establish its WUE goals by Jan. 22 and submit its first annual report July 1. According to Olive, the requirement for submitting a service meter schedule is non-applicable.
Olive offered a timeline of the citys approach to WUE goals. Its 2004 Water System Plan included a conservation plan that established three WUE goals, and the City Council adopted the WSP in 2005. In addition to focusing on WUE goals in the Jan. 7 City Council meeting, Olive noted that Resolution 767 would reaffirm those goals at the Jan. 21 City Council meeting. He added that those goals would be reevaluated in the next WSP update.
Olive summarized the citys three WUE goals as follows:
1. Achieve system-wide average water use reduction of 5 percent by 2008, and 10 percent by 2018, from 2002 levels.
2. Increase awareness among all water users of the value and importance of conserving water, and of the methods available to achieve reductions in water use.
3. Reduce unaccounted-for water to 10 percent or less.
Olive reported the city was on track to meet both the 5 percent and 10 percent reductions by their respective deadlines, based on trends for single-family residences, multi-family residences and commercial-industrial water use. He also listed the programs that the city has used to educate water users on the importance and means of conservation, including regional conservation campaigns, conservation articles in Arlington Updates, outdoor and indoor conservation kits, educational booths at summer events, and lawn watering schedules and calendars. Measures such as a Web site and an in-school curriculum are still pending.
In spite of alarming spikes in 1997 and 2001, Olive assured the Council that these elevated levels of unaccounted-for water were merely anomalies. He pointed out that, since improved reporting and accounting procedures were implemented in 2003, the citys unaccounted-for water has remained below 10 percent from 2004 forward.
Of the 521,646,616 gallons of water consumed by the city in 2007, Olive estimated that 65 percent was supplied by the Haller well, 33 percent was supplied by the Public Utility District and 3 percent was supplied by the airport. In turn, 52 percent of this water was consumed by single-family residences, 11 percent was consumed by multi-family residences and 24 percent was consumed by commercial-industrial water use. Public works accounted for 5 percent of water consumption, schools for 3 percent, the city administration for 1 percent, and water losses made of the remainder.
Olive informed the City Council that the WSP update would begin this year, and would include a reevaluation of the citys WUE goals.