Painful Choices

If rain doesn’t come soon, several Alabama utilities and private well owners are going to be busy next year scrambling to find alternative water sources.

Make that very busy, according to Dr. Jim Hairston, the Alabama Cooperative Extension System’s water coordinator and Auburn University professor of agronomy and soils who spent part of a weekend recently inspecting the effects of prolonged drought on some of the state’s public utilities.

Reservoirs and wells that supply many of the state’s public water systems already are critically low, he says.

“The fear is that if we don’t get adequate rain within the next few months, major utilities in some parts of the state will have to start looking for alternative water supplies immediately,” says Hairston.

“And bear in mind that in Alabama, October normally is the low rainfall month of the year.”

One of the most critically affected systems is Lake Weiss, supplied by the Coosa River, Hairston says.

Short of finding alternative supplies, the most critically affected utilities will have to modify intake systems in reservoirs where water has dropped below the pumping station levels. In some cases, utilities may be forced to extend or lower their pumps or to dig out new channels so that the low water levels will flow back to their pumps.

Utilities typically are reluctant to incur these types of expenses for fear that all of this could be negated by unexpected rainfall.

“On the other hand, if we have dry conditions like this for the next six months — for the rest of this year and into the next — those sorts of measures will be justified in some cases,” Hairston says.

It’s a tough call for utilities either way, he says.

Hairston recalls talking with an Extension agent recently who expressed hopes for a tropical storm front — one that potentially could dump vast amounts of rain over an extended period.

In one sense he’s right, Hairston says, adding that anything short of prolonged rainfall will not be enough to replenish parched reservoirs and wells.

“The ground is so dry,” he says, adding much of the subsurface moisture already has been used up by parched trees and plants.

During his northeast Alabama visit, Hairston noticed several cases where springs emerging from underground dissipated quickly after passing through areas heavily congested with tree and plant roots.

“You don’t have to go very far to notice that the flow stops because those plants are using the water up before it gets very far.”

In some cases, the dryness may extend down as far as 20 feet. In fact, Hairston says he’s noticed several cases where soil appears to be as parched as ever only a day or so after significant rainfall.

“You pull a weed out of your yard, and it’s already dusty despite the recent rain,” he says. “It’s going to take a lot of water to recharge what is considered the normal water-holding capacity of the soil.”

Private well owners whose supplies already have run dry already are contacting Hairston for advice about what to do next. One St. Clair County well owner reported that dry conditions forced him to lower his well pump another 40 feet. He managed to draw water for only a few minutes before water levels began to drop.

In such cases, Hairston is advising well owners to contact a certified well driller or to consider increasing well depth. Aside from that, the only other alternative is to drill a new well, he says.

Posted by Jim Langcuster at October 10, 2007 04:20 PM