Excellent collection on the subject of water conservation.
I am intrigued by the drowning deaths in LA -- is it because the area used to have flash floods/monsoon conditions much like Az?
Yes.
The numbers are quite impressive for what can be done.
Total water use for the City of LA is about 200 billion gal/year.
The stormwater can amount to 10 Bill Gallons/rainstorm, with about 10/year.
"This isn't wastewater until we waste it," said Noah Garrison, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council who co-wrote a 2009 paper on capturing and reusing storm water.
The report concluded that the region could increase local supplies by an amount equal to more than half of Los Angeles' annual water demand by incorporating relatively simple water-harvesting techniques in new construction and redevelopments
There is half of the replacement
I mentioned leaky pipes.
There are innovations in the pipes:
http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20130221/earthquake-resistant-pipes-may-bring-leak-free-la If we are like Singapore, we may loose as much as 40% of the imported water to leaks. That means that only 60% is reaching our homes. If we cut the loss from 40% to about 10%, as they did in Singapore, that means that we would get 30% more. Since the current total is 60% (not 100%, because 40% is lost), That would effectively make available 1/2 of the current total.
That's the other half. That replaces all of it.
Of course, nothing is 100% efficient.
But that doesn't even include any progress in conservation nor recycling, both of which can produce significant percentage savings.
But lets say we can't get any better than 75% off of distant sources.....I would not consider that a failure, but a huge success. The technology exists right now.
