This past weekend, I went on a quest for new knowledge, traveling to Phoenix for my first summit on water, with all the anticipation of a kid going to a new school. Learning new things about a subject or commodity that most people take for granted is always exciting, but what I really find intriguing is that water is the ultimate recycled product. The hydrological cycle of water evaporation to clouds, and its subsequent transformation to precipitation is about as pure as it gets. The most important thing we can do is not to somehow screw this process up.
In fact, the prospect of attending this particular conference had me so excited I literally couldn’t sleep the night before. This is a subject that I have thought about ever since I toured the Los Angeles wastewater treatment plant two years ago and saw that 70 percent of perfectly potable treated water was being dumped back in the ocean.
So it really resonated with me when I heard one of the speakers at the conference, Cindy Wallis-Lage from the consulting firm of Black & Veatch, emphasize that that where water is concerned, we need to change the language and the whole paradigm to eliminate references to “wastewater”. While it’s true, as she pointed out, that water may contain things like solids or sludge, these neither make it a waste product nor a commodity we can afford to waste. Her remarks reminded me of very similar discussions about solid waste and recyclables in which I have taken part. In all such cases, change starts with identifying the problem. Once we change the way we look at land-based waste or water that’s polluted, we’re on our way to a solution.
But then, most people don’t think much about water or its origins — they just turn on the tap and there it is. But water is a perfect closed loop system. The water we have on this planet is the same amount that existed when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. I believe that water is the key to how we are all connected and part of a holistic system. It is water, not oil, that is the lubricant for everything we do — in fact, oil requires a tremendous amount of water –almost 700 gallons — to create one megawatt of electricity. (Interestingly, a lack of water would result in lower CO2 levels because not one fossil-fuel-powered plant could operate without it.) Water also comprises a large part of us and is integral to our very existence.
What’s especially important is that while most of the world is covered with water, regional watersheds are our most valuable natural assets. So as I dive into the wonders of water, I can’t help but recall what Leonardo Di Vinci said: “Water drives nature” – and can’t help feeling that it also will prove a driving force in sustainability and the ways we go about achieving it.
