This summer residents across the region have used, by millions of gallons, more water.
This spike in usage goes against the regional downward trend for water use over the last several years, according to Elaine Kraft, the intergovernmental and communications director for the Cascade Water Alliance. The Alliance supplies water to Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond, Tukwila, Issaquah and the Sammamish Plateau Water and Sewer District.
“This summer is an anomaly,” Kraft said.
Due to the increase in demand during record-setting summer temperatures, coming off the heels of a winter that saw low snowpack, and in anticipation of a drier-than-normal fall, Western Washington officials are now asking people to voluntarily cut back their water use.
“We need to see a real change,” Kraft said. “We’re hoping this 10 percent cut would make a difference.”
The Cascade Water Alliance joined Seattle Public Utilities, Tacoma Water and the city of Everett Tuesday in bumping up their four-stage water shortage plan to phase two: voluntary curtailments. The advisory stage, which served as a public announcement alerting people to the potential shortage and asking them to mind their water use, went into effect July 27.
Kraft said setting a conservation goal for the public is “really critical,” and that this is something people have had to do in the past.
Officials suggest several conservation options, including reducing shower times, letting the lawn go dormant and washing only full loads of laundry or dishes.
“People probably never thought the Pacific Northwest would ever be this close to a water shortage,” Sammamish Plateau Water and Sewer District General Manager Jay Krass said Tuesday. “People really shouldn’t take this resource for granted.”
Seattle Public Utilities, which supplies water to the Alliance, has seen an increase of 10-20 percent in water use this summer, spokesman Andy Ryan said.
While only a small portion of that water supplies the cities of Sammamish and Issaquah — the majority comes from local underground aquifers, which officials say can meet the local demand — for the most part their respective water utilities have joined the region in asking people to curb their water use.
“If our customers voluntarily begin to reduce their water use, we may be able to avoid mandatory restrictions later this year,” Krass said in a press release. “In this stage, we are requesting that customers change their normal water consumption habits to use less water.”
The District saw an uptick of 17.24 percent in water use this summer compared to last year at the same time. At this rate, the District expects to have used 300 million more gallons of water this year than in a typical year.
The District’s “robust” and “diverse” water supply, Krass said, can meet the demand of its 55,000 people it serves on the Plateau and in Issaquah.
Similarly, the Northeast Sammamish Sewer & Water District, which supplies water to more than 10,000 people in the northern tip of Sammamish, has seen an increase of about 50 percent in water usage this summer compared to the last five years. That is about 9.47 million more gallons of water used, NE Sammamish Sewer & Water District General Manager Laura Keough said.
The NE District, however, is not part of the Cascade Water Alliance and is currently not implementing any kind of water shortage plan.
Since 2010, the city of Issaquah has steadily seen an increase in water use, though not by as much. It’s growing at around 2-5 percent from year to year.
City spokeswoman Autumn Monahan said the rise in water consumption is due to more than just hot weather. She said the city is using additional water meters that connect to new development.
To date, Issaquah has supplied 520.46 million gallons of water, compared to the total 787.6 million gallons used in 2014.
It is not certain if the water shortage plan will move into stage three: a mandatory cut back. Officials must wait two weeks between each stage before jumping up a notch.
For more information on how to save water, visit www.savingwater.org.
