Chico, Sustainable

The precautionary principle states that "If an action or policy might cause severe or irreversible harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of a scientific consensus that harm would not ensue, the burden of proof falls on those who would advocate taking the action." The precautionary principle serves as a point of law in the European Union, and guides many EU policies. It has also been adopted as an ordinance for the City of San Francisco and was cited in a decision in an Australian environmental court case.

I would argue that it would serve us well to apply the precautionary principle right here in Butte County. The Tuscan aquifer would be a good place to start.

It is unfortunate that the Butte Environmental Council was unable to persuade a Glenn County Superior Court judge to require more environmental review for a project by Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District to pump water from seven test wells into deep aquifers in Butte, Glenn and Tehama counties. According to BEC, GCID’s proposed project will extract a volume of ground water that approaches or exceeds the current utilization by the city of Chico, creating the likelihood of a significant adverse environmental impact.

Quoted in the Chico Beat this bast September, District Manager Thaddeus Bettner stated: "Just to be fair, we want to operate [the wells] so potentially they do cause impacts," Bettner said. "If we just operate them for a month we could say, ‘Oh there is no impact.' It's such a small amount of time. But realistically, to be honest and open about it, you need to operate them in such a manner that you look at a worst-case scenario. We'd want to do that because it's in the public interest to know those impacts."

Despite this being a "test" scenario, manipulating our aquifers in this manner doesn' t make sense to me, especially considering that they a) aren't very well understood in the first place; and b) provide water to thousands of people and supports the livelihood of hundreds of farmers (not to mention the tens of thousands of people that rely on the production of those farmers).

Even if BEC is wrong in their claim that these wells may cause a significant adverse environmental impact, I don't like the risks. There must be a better way to study the Tuscan and Tehama aquifers than by pumping water out of them.

Posted by jmiller at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are now into our second year of being homeowners in Chico, and can start seeing how some of our sustainability efforts are panning out in terms of our water bills.

The Good News

Even though this year the garden has quadrupled in size and we are babying 27 young fruit trees that we planted over the winter, our water use was down 19% in April as compared with this time last year, and 12.5% in May. The biggest reasons for this difference has been the elimination of the front lawn, the partial neglect of the backyard lawn, and the use of drip irrigation for many of the vegetables which allows for more efficient watering.

The Bad News

My wife and I used an average of 424 gallons of water every day last year, enough to fill just over 7 wine barrels every 24 hours. A huge percentage of this was used on the lawn and veggies in the summer. For example, in June of 2007 we averaged 981 gallons per day (!!!), while this past February we averaged only 123 gallons per day. In a recent letter to the editor, Chico resident Gene Lucas writes that the average California home uses 471 gallons per day. Lucas goes on to recommend that Chicoans strive to achieve less than 300 gallons per day. I concur, but at our house, at least, we have a ways to go.

Our hope is that as the trees and landscaping mature and their roots deepen, the will be able to do a better job fending for themselves in the summer. Also, we plan to continue to add landscape features such as swales and build plant communities that shade the ground from the sun, thus enabling the ground to hold winter rainwater later into the summer.

I will also plant fewer water-sucking zucchini next year.

Posted by jmiller at 07:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The neighbor's cherry tree, at least 2/3 of which is on our side of the fence, is literally dripping with fruit. My wife and I picked about 5 gallons of them in two 30 minute sessions last week. Any thoughts about how best to preserve them? The best tip we have recieved thus far is to purchase a cherry pitter for about $15. Where does one find a cherry pitter?--At Collier Hardware (established 1871) of course.

On a different topic, a friend of ours told us she keeps the sprinkler on all the time, 24 hours a day. She is on a flat rate, and doesn't see it as wasting water, rather, she feels that she is "returning it to the aquifer," and is thus in her own small way offsetting any efforts on the part of CalWater to pump and ship water from the Tuscan Aquifer to points south.

I see where she is coming from, but I respectfully disagree with her approach on scientific grounds. How deep the water from her sprinklers sink I do not know, but I doubt it will ever recharge the same aquifer from which it came. From what I understand, the recharge of the Tuscan Aquifer is in the foothills and mountains east of Chico, where the angles of the sloping rock formations allow rainfall and melting snow to slowly seep down beneath Chico as if flowing down an underground ramp.

But as I have mentioned before, most of our knowledge of the Tuscan Aquifer is best guess. As such, a substance as valuable is water is not something to be messed with lightly, and it doesn't matter are if you are a citizen who is still on a flat rate or if you are the CEO of CalWater.

Posted by jmiller at 07:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I got up close and personal with my sprinklers the other day, but it was worth it. Call me Captain Obvious, but I found out that with a screwdriver, my hands, ten minutes of time and lack over concern about getting wet, I can both control the rotation of each sprinkler head (how far it rotates to the right and left) as well as spray of the water (a continuum from “fan” to “jet”).

Adjusting the two screws on each sprinkler head is all it takes. Though you do need to do it while it is on, which will require a willingness to get a little wet.

This, combined with the half-hour I spent last year learning how to properly program the sprinkler timer, allows me full control of the time, duration, and coverage of my sprinklers.

And by watering properly, I can water less, as now my sprinklers no longer water my driveway, the sidewalk, or the exterior walls of the house.

I think I might just keep a screwdriver in my backpack, just in case I see someone who hasn’t figured it out yet.

I’ll give them an adjustment. Well, their sprinklers, at least.

Posted by jmiller at 07:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I must extend my public apologies to Gaia Creations Ecological Landscaping, who I originally neglected to recognize as an integral resource for this project. One of the things that I try to do in posting sustainability tips and eco-home projects is demonstrate and promote the "do it yourself" aspect to sustainability. All too often sustainability is seen as something that requires a budget beyond the scope of many individuals. For my wife and me, sustainability is a priority in our lives, and thus we have allotted funds toward such efforts. However, I recognize that not everyone has this ability, and it is for this reason that I did not originally disclose that I contracted with Gaia Creations to complete this project; I wanted to communicate that people could turn their lawn into a more sustainable landscape using a minimal amount of funds. Not sharing the whole truth was an error in judgment on my part.

Jeremy Miller

How to Kill Your Front Lawn

1. Get a hold of a lot of large, empty, used boxes, preferably brown (minimal ink/dyes). Plastic tape is okay, though not ideal. I found the best locations for finding boxes en masse were in the "Cardboard Only" dumpsters behind the RiteAid's.

2. If your lawn borders a driveway or sidewalk, uproot the edges of your lawn, about 6-12" in from the concrete. Either flip the sod over and leave it in place or toss it into the center of the lawn.

3. Mark the location of your sprinklers with flags or stakes. Someday you might want to know where they are.

4. Rip each box to get a single sheet of cardboard. Lay the boxes down on the lawn, overlapping about 6 inches. Be thorough and complete--do not leave any gaps. This is best done on a calm day, as wind makes this difficult.

5. Soak down the cardboard with a hose.

6. Determine the square footage of your lawn.

7. Add a layer of weed-free compost. Weeds, living parts of weeds, or weed seeds are not good, so our compost was purchased from Sutherland Landscaping. You will need about 6 yards of material for every 1000 square feet of lawn, which will give you a layer about 2" thick.

8. If you are doing this between November and February, you can choose, at this point, to sprinkle in native grass and wildflower seeds.

9. Cover the compost with a layer of wood chips. This will protect the compost from the wind and keep everything looking neat. You will need about 4.5 yards for every 1000 square feet, which will give you a layer about 1.5 inches deep. Wood chips can be purchased, or you can flag down a tree-trimmer truck trailing a wood chipper and ask them to dump the load on your driveway. Often they will do it for free. (I've done this before, though you may want to ask what they chipped. Avoid oleander and eucalyptus).

10. Water down the entire area thoroughly.

Give it a year, and your water-sucking lawn will die and decompose beneath the cardboard, becoming usable nutrients for new plants in a few years. The cardboard will likewise decompose in 2-5 years.

We were able to toss in a few wildflower seeds when we did the project, but otherwise we will not be adding much more until the winter when we can take advantage of the winter rains. When we put in larger plants and shrubs, we will clear away some of the chips and cut a small hole through cardboard for the plant. We will replace the wood chips when we are done.

Any new plants will require a bit of watering in the first 1-2 years to get established (we will be using a drip system), but then you are home free if you have planted local native varieties (ceanothus, bunch grasses etc).

Full Disclosure: Figures reflect a 1700 square foot lawn--

-Labor and Technical Advice: As we are novices to landscaping, we contracted with Gaia Creations Ecological Landscaping to provide labor, materials, technical expertise and wisdom. We used Gaia Creations because of their dedication to organic horticulture and sustainable landscape methods.
-Weed-free compost: 10 yards, $471 (with 10% contractor discount)
-Shredded cedar bark: 7.5 yards, $218 (with 10% contractor discount; could have been free if I had tracked down a truck full of wood chips)
-Boxes: Free
-Time: About two days for two people
-Savings and piece of mind from not needing to ever again mow, fertilize, water or edge a lawn: Priceless

Posted by jmiller at 10:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have definite opinions about green grassy lawns. They are pleasant to walk on, great for picnicking, superior for sports, and pretty darn boring to look at.

If your lawn is solely for gazing purposes, here are some thoughts:

-They require more watering than any landscaping feature save a pond.
-They require year-round maintenance (mowing and edging), as often as once a week in the summer months. And if you skip a week or two it becomes very obvious.
-Many varieties of grass require regular doses of fertilizer in order to maintain their health.

For these reasons and a few others, my wife and I have bid farewell to the front lawn. A couple weeks ago the grass was covered with a layer of cardboard followed by a layer of compost and topped with wood chips. This coming winter we will be contracting to install drought-tolerant trees and shrubs, native bunch grasses, and perennial and annual California wildflowers. Once it gets established (1-2 years), it will require only occasional summer watering, and none in the winter. The maintenance requirements will change: Rather than spending 20-30 minutes a week mowing between May and September, we plan on spending an afternoon trimming, pruning, etc. 4-5 days a year. Best of all, I can look forward to butterflies, native bees, hummingbirds, the sweet smell of spring blossoms, and a rainbow of colors appearing throughout the seasons.

We plan on keeping the lawn in the backyard (where we picnic, play, and walk barefoot). Here is what we do to conserve water when caring for the grass:
--The sprinklers are timed to water in the morning, just before sunrise. This ensures the maximum amount of water will fall on the grass, rather than evaporate in the sun. Night or evening watering is not recommended, as it can encourage mold and fungus.
--The sprinklers are turned off during rainier weeks and during the winter months.
--Sprinklers are maintained such that they water the lawn, rather than the concrete patio or the fence.
--The existing backyard grass will eventually be replaced with a more drought-tolerant, native blend of grasses that will require even less water.

Thank you to Gaia Creations Ecological Landscaping for providing much of the information that is included in this post.

Next post: How I Killed My Lawn

Posted by jmiller at 10:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I attended a two-day "Introduction to Permaculture" course over the weekend and came back with a wealth of ideas and inspirations surrounding sustainable living.

One of them was the olla, a simple, low-tech water saving device for gardening.

An olla is an unglazed pot that you bury neck-deep into a mound of soil. The pot is filled with water which very slowly percolates through the porous clay walls. Veggies are then planted adjacent to the ollas. It is said that 90-100% of the water placed in the olla is eventually absorbed by the plants, whose roots hug the outside of the pot.

Attaching a drip irrigation system to your ollas is also an option.

The ollas can be purchased through Peddler's Wagon for $20-$25/each, OR

You supposedly can make your own "diamond-shaped" olla by gluing together two flower pots with silicone or acrylic caulk and then plugging up the drain on one end, OR

You can go the super low-tek route by using a 1-gallon plastic milk jug with some small holes punched into it. The drawbacks here are that some folks are not thrilled to burying plastic into their vegetable gardens, and they tend to not be as durable as the ollas, which have been known to last for decades (as opposed to 2 years for the milk jug).

I am going to try out the flower pot strategy.

Posted by jmiller at 09:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sometimes trying to do the right thing just isn't easy.

The dishwasher, hot water tank and my house's 1959 water pipes are conspiring against me and my eco-conscious ways.

I try to wash dishes in the most energy and water-efficient manner possible. The Green Industry would have you believe that this is a pretty basic exercise:

Wash a full load of dishes in the dishwasher, rather than by hand. Do not pre-rinse the dishes. Ideally, use an Energy-Star dishwasher on Normal Cycle. Allow your dishes to air-dry.

All of this is fine, assuming you have a dishwasher. If you are washing by hand, try to do so without keeping the water running. People who have bought dishwashers know they are not cheap appliances, especially good dishwashers. Many folks are stuck with what they have. However, when it does come time to replace your dishwasher, and you can afford it, get an energy-efficient one. Also, spending a little extra for a well-made dishwasher can save money in the long run in terms of being able to avoid maintenance costs.

Which brings us to the present dilemma. I have the Energy-Star dishwasher, and I am using the normal wash cycle, and I am letting my dishes air-dry. Yet I am still wasting water and energy. Here's why:

1) The manual begins by instructing me to run the water in the sink until the water gets hot. For the antiquated piping system in my house, that requires, sadly, about a minute and a half of letting the water run down the sink. The best I can do is time when I run the dishwasher to coincide to when I am washing larger pots and pans, otherwise I am wasting water.

2) If the water is not hot enough for the dishwasher, I am told that it will heat the water up itself, though its hot water heater is less efficient than that of the house. This is why the manual says to run water in the sink first to get the water hot.

3) I keep the hot water heater in my house set on "warm," which is fine a fine temperature for showers and washing clothes, but is apparently below the "ideal temperature" for doing dishes (I have been told that at lower temperatures the dish soap doesn't "activate" and clean the dishes properly). So even after I have run the hot water in the sink for the sake of the dishwasher, the dishwasher still needs to heat the water further.

4) Lastly, I could set the temperature on my hot water heater higher, but the issue is that the previous owners felt that the house needed a 50 gallon tank. Keeping that much water heated to the hottest temperature simply for the sake of the dishwasher (which is run 1-2 times a week) doesn't make much sense. The tank is less than three years old, so economically there is no point to replacing it at the present time (though when we do we will likely consider a tankless system).

It's all just frustrating. That's all I've got to say.

Almost makes one want to switch to using disposable paper plates and plastic utensils.

Just kidding.

Posted by jmiller at 11:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Water-Saving Tip #212*: The Royal Flush

TIME TO IMPLEMENT TIP: 2 minutes
WATER SAVINGS: 3000-6000 gallons per year for a family of 4.
COST SAVINGS: About $2.50 - $5.00 per year
EQUIPMENT NEEDED: 2-4 glass jars, with lids.

Essentially, this strategy allows your toilet to flush using less water. Simply fill the jars with water or rocks, put the lids on tightly, and place 1-2 into each toilet tank. I placed jars totaling about 1 gallon into the two 3.5 gallon toilets in my house. Flush once to be sure that the placement of the jars does not affect the flushing mechanism. Bricks or large rocks can also work.

The jars effectively reduce the volume of the tank, and less water will be required to fill it. In my case, I reduced the size of each of my toilet tanks by 0.5 gallons. This could potentially affect the ability of your toilet to flush effectively, but speaking personally, I have never had a problem. On the occasion that you do find yourself requiring an extra-long “sit,” just remember to flush twice (once one you think you are halfway done. . .).

For those who desire to conserve more water, have more time, and bigger budget, lower-flush toilets are also available for purchase (1.6 gallons per flush toilets have been standard since 1992), and require even less water to operate. Composting toilets (no water required) are also beginning to gain popularity, though they are not yet approved for use in all cities and counties. I am uncertain of the regulations for Butte County or the City of Chico.

What I would like to see in my house someday is the used water from the bathroom shower and sink (a.k.a “greywater”) being used to fill the tank of a low-flush toilet.

Of course, there is always the "If its yellow, let it mellow, if its brown, flush it down" slogan, which does conserve quite a bit of water, but I will save that charming discussion for a later post.

*The number “212” means absolutely nothing.

Posted by jmiller at 01:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This is the second of two posts about basics of Chico's water, where it comes from, and how we use it.

People move to Chico to go to college, escape the Bay Area, or perhaps to take a job. Other folks might make a list of all the things they are looking for in a town, such as bikeability, sunny weather, a vibrant downtown, attractive city parks, and easy access to mountains and wild areas, and realize that Chico might be the place they want to be.

But there are a few folks that move here because of the Tuscan Aquifer. Like the pink sea of spring almond blossoms, it is a bonus that one discovers later (if at all).

Continue reading "Valuing Chico's Drinking Water" »

Posted by jmiller at 06:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This is the first of two posts about the basics of Chico's water, where it comes from, and how we use it.

What is groundwater?

The first thing we Chico residents need to know is that our tap water does not come from Chico Creek, Butte Creek, the Sacramento River, or any other surface source. Rather, it is pumped out of the ground, and is thus termed "groundwater."

The first time I heard the word "groundwater" I imagined (as I am sure many do) an underground lake, or perhaps a series of caves filled with water. To access the wet stuff, one simply dug a hole down to the cave. Lower the bucket, fill it with water, and drink up.

Not quite. If this is still your image of groundwater, now is the time to let it go. This is important to understand, because we are talking about what we bath our children in, shower with, boil food in, and drink.

Continue reading "Understanding Chico's Drinking Water" »

Posted by jmiller at 02:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)