Water Wise: Don't Favor Change? Speak Up

The words “green” and “sustainable” could be buzzwords of the decade. But how do the concepts behind “green” and “sustainable” work with irrigation?  Can we have “green irrigation” or “sustainable irrigation”?  If we actually can achieve those goals, will it change how you design, install or manage irrigation systems?

Unfortunately or fortunately (depending on your perspective), the way you approach irrigation is going to change.
 
In the last few months, a number of various proposed guidelines, standards and specifications for landscape and commercial irrigation have come out for stakeholder comment. These include: 

• The EPA’s WaterSense for Homes
• The American Society of Landscape Architects’ Sustainable Sites Initiative
• The United States Green Building Councils LEED for Neighborhood Development
• The Green Building Initiatives’ commercial buildings standard
• And the California Department of Water Resources’ Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance.

As an irrigation or landscape contractor, you are a stakeholder in these various initiatives. They will most likely affect your livelihood and how you do business in the future. You need to be aware of these initiatives and be proactive about influencing their content or suffer the consequences.

Many of these initiatives limit either the amount of turfgrass that can be planted, the amount of water that can be used to irrigate or the plant palette you can select from. In all of them, potable water for irrigation is frowned upon and alternative sources such as rain water, storm water or reclaimed water are preferred. These are potentially all good ideas, but do they make sense? 

For example, the WaterSense for Homes specification requires either no more than 40 percent of the landscaped area be turf or the landscape be within a specific, calculated water budget. It would be nice to have 40-percent turf in Las Vegas or Phoenix, but it will use more water than a conventional landscape does. And where are the water savings? 

The water budget calculation (Maximum Applied Water Allowance) requires that the landscape use on average be no more than 60 percent of the evapotranspiration (ET). Science has shown that watering at 80 percent of ET will work with no detrimental effect to the turf, but 60 percent certainly has no basis of research behind it. The specification also penalizes highly efficient irrigation systems. To achieve the overall 60 percent, the plant factor cannot exceed 0.43, which dictates a very strict plant palette. With this specification, the EPA is also trying to apply a national standard to what should at minimum be a regional-based specification. But climates are different – one size does not fit all.

The California model ordinance also has a Maximum Applied Water Allowance. Its ET adjustment factor of 0.7 was opposed by the California landscape and irrigation industries, but is still being proposed. The ordinance also demands a number of other irrigation system requirements, including a minimum irrigation efficiency of 71 percent, dedicated landscape water meters that must be installed on all landscapes greater than 5,000 square feet, rain shut-offs,  low volume irrigation in mulched planting areas and no overhead irrigation permitted within 24 inches of any non-permeable surface.

Many of these are good ideas, but they will change how you install irrigation. Even though you may not work in California, remember the maxim: As goes California, so goes the irrigation industry.

The sustainable sites initiative is really a continuation of the LEED rating system for new buildings. It recertifies projects to verify that the site performs as anticipated over time. Much like LEED, it provides points for reducing potable water consumption for irrigation or eliminating potable water consumption for irrigation. Keep in mind that, with these initiatives, naturally occurring subsurface water such as a geothermal or groundwater is considered potable even though it’s not drinkable. So, it is not considered an alternative irrigation water source. It further requires that flow meters be installed to record and monitor water use of all irrigated areas.

You may think that none of these issues will ever impact you and, therefore, you don’t need to worry about them. But all of these specifications, guidelines or standards will dictate how you can landscape and water in the future. How do you maintain a landscape if you do not have enough water? How do you separate yourself from the competition if everybody has to use the same plant material?
 
These questions and initiatives need to be taken seriously. If you don’t like them, you should support the landscape and irrigation organizations that are fighting them by being proactive, getting online, reading the proposed requirements and responding. Let your voice be heard.               

Brian Vinchesi is a former president of both the Irrigation Association and the American Society of Irrigation Consultants. His firm, Irrigation Consulting, Inc., is based in Pepperell, Mass. He can be reached at bvinchesi@irrigationconsulting.com.