Date : Wed, 5 Oct 2016 17:24:53 -0400
DEP Schedules Drought Hearing When They Haven't Listened
The DEP has scheduled a public hearing to discuss its plan to designate a formal drought warning for 12 counties in the northeastern, central and northern coastal regions of New Jersey. These counties include Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Morris, Ocean, Passaic, Somerset and Union. Burlington, Camden, Gloucester, Salem, Sussex and Warren are currently under a drought watch. New Jersey’s drought is not only a result of low rainfall, but more about increase of pollution, poor quality, and the DEP’s failure to clean-up our waterways. Reservoir levels like the Oradell have plummeted to below half their normal capacity. However, the DEP wasn’t conducting any drought monitoring and has proposed rules to roll back water quality protections, making droughts worse. The public hearing will take place on Thursday, October 20th 10 a.m. at the Millburn Free Public Library, 200 Glen Avenue, Millburn, Essex County.
“The DEP is scheduling a formal drought warning for most of New Jersey, but this is too little too late. They are having a public hearing, but they haven’t been listening that we have been in a drought for the last six months. Instead of issuing warnings to trigger statewide actions such as water restrictions and rationing for the past few months, the DEP have failed to act. More than half of the state is experiencing a drought, but the Christie Administration has actually caused this drought by failing to clean-up our waterways,” said Jeff Tittel, New Jersey Sierra Club Director. “This drought is a result of DEP’s failure to address sprawl and overdevelopment. They have even proposed a series of rollbacks that will add pollution to our waterways and make this drought worse. The DEP’s proposals will add more development in environmentally sensitive areas, getting rid of stream buffers, which will add more pollution to our waterways. When streams and rivers are at low flow conditions, those streams are highly polluted. By failing to clean-up our rivers, we’ve hurt our water supply because the streams are too dirty to take the water out of.”
The Department of Environmental Protections have done nothing to combat the issue of droughts, pollution, nor have they protected us from mitigating climate change that can exasperate drought. New Jersey’s reservoirs have been operating below average levels, while stream flows and ground water levels are also low, particularly in the northeast quadrant of the state. This drought poses a risk because streams are running between 75 to 90 percent below normal flow. The New Jersey Sierra Club believes the DEP needs a much more proactive system to deal with droughts that includes cleaning up and reducing pollution in our waterways.
“While the Passaic River is running over 90 percent water discharge from over 70 sewer plants, the DEP has proposed to undermine protections for sewer plants. The Raritan River has over 80 percent sewer discharge from 60 sewer plants, but we may see even more sewer discharge if the DEP moves forward to get rid of the CAP on pollution. This is a result of the Christie Administration taking care of polluters and developers over the people of New Jersey. Every year when we have a drought, streams end up looking like lawns and turn green because all the algae. The reason is the high level nutrients entering our waterways cause algae to grow and dissolved oxygen levels to drop,” said Jeff Tittel. “When there are low flow conditions and peak demand in parts of New Jersey, especially Bergen County, we can run out of water. This is because we don’t have enough water storage in reservoirs like the Oradell to make up from peak demand and not being able to take from these streams during a drought. DEP’s failure to address this drought not only impacts the environment, but public health.”
Not only have the DEP not cleaned-up important water supply resources throughout the state, they are making amendments to increase development and sewer hook-ups, while limiting the amount of sewerage treatment plants who comply with pollution limits. The changes in the New Jersey Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NJPDES) changes the requirements from using a 3-month flow average to a 12-year average, which means the plants will miss peak flows. By using the 12-month flow, it gets around the CAP and increase flows without having the sewer plants comply.
“New Jersey’s drought shows the Christie Administration’s failure to adequately cleanup and protect our waterways. At many of our major water supply intakes, the water is either too low or too dirty to be able to take in during drought conditions. Instead of addressing water quality, the DEP wants to make amendments to the NJDPES and Water Quality Management Planning Rules, which will play games with the ‘CAP’ on pollution. These changes will threaten our waterways by undermining protections in place to reduce pollution at sewer treatment plants and will actually increase septic systems in environmentally sensitive areas,” said Tittel.
Under the proposed rules, sewerage treatment plants could even be discharging 2.5 times permitted flow. This would violate the flows at certain times of the year and cause much more pollution, but would be allowed. Under the former rule with the 80 percent trigger, plants would have to have to do things to adjust and the inflow and infiltration (I&I) would be triggered. Now the CAP has been raised to 100 percent, this means you don't need to take corrective action until there is no capacity left. These changes will actually decrease our available water supply.
“While millions of people are under a drought, DEP is rolling back protections on clean water. With yearly averages, the proposed rules will allow sewerage plants to violate your permit many times without any consequences or even be required to address the pollution. Only if the plant reaches the 100 percent permitted flow limit, do they now need to take action to reduce pollution. However, this will mean fewer plants coming in to do reductions under the 100 percent threshold, causing more development and more pollution. It also takes away municipalities’ ability to submit plans and releases the towns’ ability to deal with problems. Without proper planning, by only having sewerage authorities apply; towns can keep doing permits without water conservation. This lack of oversight is not only happening under the CAP rule, but also under the proposed WQMP rules. This is clearly a one-two punch that will threaten our drinking water supply at a time while we are running out of it,” said Tittel.
As of now, the state of New Jersey does not require action on conservation until a drought warning is in effect and before DEP acts it may be too late. We believe we need to implement conservation measures much sooner. A drought watch, not just a drought warning, should require conservation. Also New Jersey does have alternative day watering, gray watering systems programs and there is nothing to stop a resident from turning their sprinklers on while it is raining. Scientists expect that increased rising in global temperature, will cause more severe rain and snowstorms, and increased drought periods and wildfires. These instances will only lessen water availability. While we should be encouraging water conservation, Governor Christie has eliminated the Office of Climate Change in DEP to study these impacts and help develop plans to combat the impacts.
“The DEP has looked the other way for over a year and have put no real conservation measures in place. As climate disruption worsens with global warming, extreme weather, sea level rise, and droughts, the DEP’s failure to act has threatened our families and communities. The Christie Administration has rolled back our goals to make New Jersey a leader for reducing greenhouse gases and cut our renewable energy from 30% to 22.5% goals. Instead of protecting us from climate change, Christie has closed the Office of Climate Change, stolen a billion dollars out of the Clean Energy Fund, crashed the solar market and refused to release the financing rules for offshore wind off our coast,” said Tittel.
The state Water Supply Master
“It is shameful that New Jersey has not updated the Water Supply Master Plan in almost 20 years. Without it we don’t even know how much water we have or the best strategies to preserve or protect our water supply. Failing to update the plan is part of the Christie administration’s attack on clean water. This lack of action has put the environment and public health at risk,” said Jeff Tittel.
There are several steps New Jersey should take to improve its water supply and quality:
We must fix the drought warning system to include additional indicators, like ground water levels, stream flows, soil conditions, and crop and forest conditions
We are not planning for the impact of climate change and change in weather patterns and how this will impact our water supply
We need to overhaul the drought rules to give the DEP stronger authority to conserve water and clean up our streams and rivers
Water conservation requirements, such as odd and even lawn watering, must go in to effect much sooner
Rain sensors on irrigation equipment and sprinklers should be required all of the time, not just when there is a drought
More streams should be designed as Category One protection
Overdevelopment must be limited above our critical supply reservoirs and intakes
Our Water Supply Master Plan needs updating. It was last completed in 1995 with 1986 data and is woefully out of date and inadequate, yet it still guides decisions
We need to stop weakening our stormwater and sewer rules
Leaky infrastructure should be fixed. In many of our cities, aging infrastructure leaks out 25 to 30 percent of its water due to old pipes that were put in over a century ago
Passed fertilizer legislation but waiting to see how well it will be implemented
Soil compaction regulations should be established
Polluted waterways should be cleaned through water quality based effluent limits
Impervious cover should be limited in areas with depleted groundwater and in our main water supply intakes
Our sewer plants need to be upgraded
The state needs to recalculate its safe yields based on changes that have occurred due to impervious cover and depleted uses
We also need to plan for the impacts to our water supply due to climate change and sea level rise
“DEP is proposing tips to reduce water consumption, but it may be way too late because of their rollbacks. Unless we take serious measures to manage and protect our water supply, we could run out. This would be devastating to our economy since our three largest industries are water dependent including tourism, agriculture, food processing, and pharmaceuticals,” said Jeff Tittel, Director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. “Instead of learning from the drought problems California is experiencing, New Jersey has looked the other way. This drought is serious because DEP’s failure to act may mean we could be the first state east of the Rockies that runs out of water.”
The DEP press release can be found below:
IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Contact: Lawrence Hajna (609) 984-1795
October 5, 2016 Bob Considine (609) 292-2994
Caryn Shinske (609) 984-1795
DEP SCHEDULES OCTOBER 20 PUBLIC HEARING FOR POSSIBLE
DROUGHT WARNING FOR MUCH OF NEW JERSEY
DROUGHT WATCH ISSUED FOR LARGE PORTION OF SOUTHERN NEW JERSEY AND REMAINS IN EFFECT FOR NORTHWESTERN PART OF STATE
(16/P93) TRENTON - The Department of Environmental Protection has scheduled an Oct. 20 public hearing in anticipation of designating a formal drought warning for 12 counties in the northeastern, central and northern coastal regions of New Jersey, a step that will enable the DEP to work with suppliers to balance storage among reservoir systems.
The hearing, scheduled for 10 a.m. at the Millburn Free Public Library, 200 Glen Avenue, Millburn, Essex County, is a required step prior to the DEP issuing formal drought warning measures for the following counties: Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Morris, Ocean, Passaic, Somerset and Union.
In addition, the DEP today issued a drought watch for Burlington, Camden, Gloucester, Monmouth, Ocean and Salem counties and has continued a drought watch in Sussex and Warren counties that has been in effect since July. The designation of a watch formally urges residents of these counties to voluntarily conserve water.
"The recent rainfall we received, while spanning several days, was not enough to reverse downward trends in our water supplies due to extended dry weather patterns over most the year," DEP Commissioner Bob Martin said. "It is very important for residents and businesses across New Jersey to voluntarily conserve water - especially regarding non-essential water use, such as watering lawns and landscaping - until we get sufficient rainfall to replenish supplies."
A drought warning, which could officially take effect shortly after the hearing unless more abundant rainfall occurs, will establish a formal process for the DEP to work with suppliers to ensure no region faces a significant shortfall should dry weather and high customer demand continue. The goal is to avert a drought emergency declaration, which would necessitate mandatory restrictions on water use by the public.
The purpose of the hearing will be to gather information from the general public, water suppliers and other stakeholders on the current status of water supplies and to discuss steps that can be taken to mitigate water use and manage those supplies, while enhancing public awareness. The DEP has already been consulting with major water suppliers to discuss cooperative transfers among systems.
"We are all in this together," said Daniel Kennedy, DEP's Assistant Commissioner for Water Resource Management. "We will work productively with all of our water systems to ensure proper management of our supplies as we continue to monitor precipitation."
On July 25 , the DEP had issued a drought watch for Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Morris, Passaic, Somerset, Sussex, Union and Warren counties.
The DEP utilizes a number of indicators to gauge the impacts lack of precipitation has on water supplies, including reservoir levels, stream flows, and levels in shallow groundwater sources, also known as unconfined aquifers.
["It is very important for residents and businesses across New Jersey to voluntarily conserve water - especially regarding non-essential water use, such as watering lawns and landscaping - until we get sufficient rainfall to replenish supplies." --Commissioner Bob Martin]Reservoir systems in the northeastern and northern coastal parts of the state have been grappling with below-normal precipitation for much of the year. Reservoir storage typically declines at this time of year due to heavy usage and normal summer weather patterns.
Major reservoir systems, however, are below their normal levels for this time of year, and may need management of interconnections to balance storage in if significant rainfall does not occur by the time of the hearing.
These are the current conditions in sections of the state that rely on reservoirs:
The Northeast Combined Reservoir System - 12 reservoirs operated by four water suppliers serving the most densely populated region of the state - is 11 percent below its normal storage level of approximately 45 billion gallons for this time of year.
The New Jersey Water Supply Authority's Raritan Basin reservoirs - serving densely populated central parts of the state - are 22 percent below their normal storage level of approximately 64 billion gallons for this time of year.
The combined storage in reservoirs serving portions of Monmouth and Ocean counties are 16 percent below their normal storage of seven billion gallons.
The southwestern part of the state - Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Salem counties - relies primarily on groundwater. Stream flows and groundwater are rated as severely dry under indicators utilized by the DEP in this area. Rainfall in this area is rated as moderately dry.
Sussex and Warren counties also rely largely on groundwater. Stream flow and shallow groundwater in these counties are rated as severely dry, while precipitation is rated as moderately dry.
In the southern coastal region of the state - Atlantic, Cape May and Cumberland counties - rainfall is near or above normal, stream flow is considered moderately dry, and shallow ground water is considered severely dry. The DEP is continuing to monitor conditions but at this time has not issued a drought watch for these counties.
The DEP offers the following tips to reduce this use:
At this time, it is appropriate to just let your lawns go dormant. If you decided to water lawns, do so sparingly. Two times per week for 20 minutes is sufficient.
Use a hose with a hand-held nozzle to water flowers and shrubs.
Avoid watering lawns and plants during the heat of the day, since much of this water will evaporate without helping the lawn.
Use a broom to sweep the sidewalk, rather than a hose.
To save water at home, fix leaky faucets and pipes. Consider replacing your toilet with a low-flow version; this can save around 11,000 gallons per year.
Turn off the faucet while brushing teeth and shaving.
Run washing machines and dishwashers only when full.
Upgrade your showerhead to low-flow versions; they can save some 7,700 gallons per year.
Upgrade your faucets or install faucet aerators; this can save some 16,000 gallons per year.
For more state water supply status information, visit: www.njdrought.org/
For more detailed information on water conservation technologies and interesting facts, visit: www.nj.gov/dep/
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Toni Granato Administrative Assistant New Jersey Sierra Club office:(609) 656-7612 https://www.facebook.com/NJSierraClub @NJSierraClub and @StopPilgrimNYNJ on Twitter
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Received on 2016-10-05 14:24:53