Letters to the Editor
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Where is the mention of recycled water?
As someone who grew up in CT, and for the past 5 years has lived in Melbourne, Australia I've seen two vastly different attitudes to water.
CT is by no means on the great lakes, but water is not a problem there. When my parents talked about a 'drought' they basically meant that their lawns were looking a bit brown because it hadn't rained in a few days.
Melbourne is in the throes of a decades-long drought (begging the question of when does a drought stop being a drought and start just being considered the normal climate?) Meanwhile the population here has been growing at a record pace (no thanks to immigrants like myself!)
What baffles me is that with a drought that has lasted over 10 years, the local government has done virtually nothing to seriously fix the problem. Water restrictions are a good SHORT TERM solution, but do nothing to solve the long-term issue of a growing population and dwindling supply.
Instead of looking for new ways to pump water from far-off places (destroying ecosystems and costing millions to build pipelines in the process), why don't cities start recycling their water? This is almost certainly both the most cost-effective and environmentally friendly solution. And yes, by recycled water, I mean treated effluent. (like, OMG, drinking pee!)
Effluent that has been treated to a high standard is often cleaner than water that has been pumped out of 'natural' resivors. It must meet incredibly high standards to be considered drinkable. Altering existing sewage treatment plants to make them able to fully recycle water back into the drinking water supply makes the most sense (or at least a lot more sense than pumping water from Lake Michigan). Cities should make the water restrictions permanent, and start building water recycling plants. Anyone who has a problem with drinking highly treated effluent can move back to upstate New York, or build a bridge and get over it.
Its just a shame for everyone from the fishes to the 4 million inhabitants of Atlanta that local governments are too scared to introduce drinking recycled water because of perceived public backlash.