Tuesday, 25 March 2008
What You Can do for Water Infrastructure
I just got back from a fantastic vacation in New Mexico. While I tried to make it a real vacation and not think about work, I couldn’t keep myself from thinking about infrastructure completely. New Mexico’s official nickname is the Land of Enchantment, and for a city girl from Washington, DC, the scenery definitely lives up to its name. What is not so enchanting, however, is the state’s water infrastructure.
While New Mexico suffers from the same aging and poorly-maintained facilities that the rest of the country does, the real trouble in the Southwest lies in water supply. Most of New Mexico is mountainous desert (Albuquerque’s elevation is greater than 6000 ft.) and the only substantial source of fresh water comes from the Rio Grande. Disputes over water rights are frequent and heated.
Despite these problems, New Mexicans seem to be doing their part to conserve. At restaurants, diners are not served water unless it is asked for and toilets don’t flush quite as robustly as we easterners are used to – to name a few examples. Strict Design Review Boards ensure not only the historical and cultural integrity of architecture, but insist that landscaping use only native plants that don’t require much water.
These adaptations may seem particular to one region’s problems, but it cannot be forgotten that all over the country and the world, water infrastructure is endangered by lack of maintenance and inadequate investment levels. ASCE’s 2005 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure graded the nation’s drinking water and wastewater at a D-. The most recent EPA Clean Watersheds survey called for an investment of $134.4 billion for waste and storm water infrastructure and the EPA also anticipates a nearly $1 trillion need for drinking water over the next two decades.
These numbers are a lot for anyone to take and may seem like the average person cannot do anything to change the situation. The needs are staggering, and it will take tremendous political leadership to reverse the damages from years of neglect, but there are things the average person can do - like replacing old washers on faucets, avoiding flushing the toilet unnecessarily, and taking shorter showers, to name a few . While we need to conserve the water that we have, it is still plentiful and cheap, and so we must remember that around the world, millions of people do not have access to adequate water infrastructure. ASCE is partnering with Engineers Without Borders to use our members’ technical skills to bring the same kind of infrastructure we enjoy in the U.S. to other parts of the world.
The work that Engineers Without Borders does and the water consumption habits of New Mexicans may not be applicable to your neighborhood, but they do demonstrate that the average person can make a difference. Infrastructure-spotting tourism may not sound like the ideal vacation, but next time you are somewhere away from home, take a look around you, you might learn something.