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Archives for October 2014

Hawaii River Restorations Reflect National Desire to Protect Water for Public Benefit

October 31, 2014

By Codi Kozacek
Circle of Blue

(28 October 2014)

Streams that have been drained dry for more than a century flowed again on the Hawaiian island of Maui last week following the return of water diverted to supply sugar plantations in the island’s arid central plains. The restorations are the result of a series of legal challenges to the commodification of Hawaii’s water—by state law a resource held for the benefit of the public—and are part of a national trend to protect tributaries and groundwater resources that support cultural, ecological and recreational water uses.

See Full Article Here

 

Filed Under: Groundwater, Rainfall, Streams and Rivers, Water Conservation

Shopping for Water: How the Market Can Mitigate Water Shortages in the American West

October 23, 2014

The Hamilton Project:  Culp, Glennon and Libecap

underground-aquifier

In addition to suffering from a long drought, Central California is depleting its underground aquifers. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

 

 

(Kobayashi Comments:   While not all of this is applicable to the islands, some of it provides fruit for thought especially the use of market driven factors to control use in drought situations…)

The American West has a long tradition of conflict over water. But after fifteen years of drought across the region, it is no longer simply conflict: it is crisis. In the face of unprecedented declines in reservoir storage and groundwater reserves throughout the West, we focus in this discussion paper on a set of policies that could contribute to a lasting solution: using market forces to facilitate the movement of water resources and to mitigate the risk of water shortages.

We begin by reviewing key dimensions of this problem: the challenges of population and economic growth, the environmental stresses from overuse of common water resources, the risk of increasing water-supply volatility, and the historical disjunction that has developed between and among rural and urban water users regarding the amount we consume and the price we pay for water. We then turn to five proposals to encourage the broader establishment and use of market institutions to encourage reallocation of water resources and to provide new tools for risk mitigation. Each of the five proposals offers a means of building resilience into our water management systems.

Many aspects of Western water law impose significant obstacles to water transactions that, given the substantial and diverse interests at stake, will take many years to reform. However, Western states can take an immediate step to enable more-flexible use of water resources by allowing simple, short-term water transactions. First, sensible water policy should allow someone who needs water to pay someone else to forgo her use of water or to invest in water conservation and, in return, to obtain access to the saved water. As a second step, state and local governments should facilitate these transactions by establishing essential market institutions, such as water banks, that can serve as brokers, clearinghouses, and facilitators of trade.

Third, water managers should support and encourage the use of market-driven risk management strategies to address growing variability and uncertainty in water supplies. These strategies include the use of dry-year options to provide for water sharing in the face of shortages, and water trusts to protect environmental values. New reservoir management strategies that allow for sophisticated, market-driven use of storage could build additional resilience into water distribution.

Fourth, states should better regulate the use of groundwater to ensure sustainability and to bring groundwater under the umbrella of water trading opportunities. Groundwater reserves are an important environmental resource and provide strategic reserves against drought, but proper management of groundwater is also critical to the development of markets. Markets cannot work effectively if users can delay facing the realities of local water scarcity through the unsustainable use of an open-access resource.

Finally, strong federal leadership will be necessary to promote interstate and interagency cooperation in water management, as well as to coordinate essential state-level gathering of data on water supplies and water use. In particular, the Bureau of Reclamation of the U.S. Department of the Interior plays a central role in water projects across the West, and its actions will be essential in confronting the crisis.

Filed Under: Groundwater, Water Conservation

Girls Scouts of Hawaii receive NOAA grant to study fresh water

October 8, 2014

By Larry Kobayashi, Hawaii First Water (8 October 2014)

The $92,500 grant will allow the Girl Scouts of Hawai’i (GS-HI) to launch its After School Hours Program Wonders of Water! project, a watershed and environmental education program for girls in low income Hawaii communities. The girls will learn and inspire others to adopt responsible stewardship practices to create healthy ecosystems in their home state.

 

Filed Under: Groundwater

US EPA, DOH require Hawaii Department of Transportation to protect Oahu’s coastal waters

October 8, 2014

Contact Information: Dean Higuchi, 808-541-2711, higuchi.dean@epa.gov

 

HONOLULU – The U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Hawaii Department of Health have reached an agreement with the Hawaii Department of Transportation (HDOT) that requires the department to pay a $1.2 million penalty and correct federal Clean Water Act stormwater violations at the Honolulu and Kalaeloa Harbors on Oahu.

“Stormwater discharges pollute Hawaii’s streams and coastal waters,” said Jared Blumenfeld, EPA’s Regional Administrator for the Pacific Southwest. “By making long-term changes to its operations, HDOT is taking major steps to increase the protection of beaches, coral reefs and water quality on Oahu.”

Inspections by EPA and DOH in December 2008 first identified the Clean Water Act stormwater violations at the harbor facilities. Stormwater runoff from unpaved land areas, paved streets and maintenance yards contains contaminants such as sediments, trash, chemicals, and oils that can flow into waterways and coastal zones, resulting in environmental damage. By creating a system of project review and oversight inspections, installing treatment systems, and exercising better control over tenant activities, HDOT can significantly reduce the amount of pollutants discharged in stormwater runoff.

“Storm water carries contamination from the land into the ocean; this is the biggest source of water pollution in our islands,” said Gary Gill, Department of Health Deputy Director for Environmental Health. “All landowners are responsible to protect our streams and coastlines. With this case settled, we can expect our state government to be a better steward of Hawaii’s clean waters.”

The $1.2 million in penalties will be divided equally between the State of Hawaii and the United States, and the settlement requires HDOT to undertake a variety of actions to improve the management of stormwater runoff at the two harbors, including:

· Create a new Office of Environmental Compliance to ensure all HDOT facilities comply with federal, state and local environmental regulations. Develop a stormwater prevention outreach and training program to communicate with the public using harbor facilities, to inform the public about how their activities impact the quality of stormwater runoff.

· Rank all harbor tenants annually based on their activities and risk of pollutant discharges. Inspect all high risk tenants twice per year, medium risk tenants once per year, and low risk tenants every five years.

· Inspect stormwater outfalls during wet and dry weather for the presence of non-stormwater discharges, and assess the physical condition of each outfall to determine if maintenance is needed.

· Establish a comprehensive Construction Runoff Control Program to control discharges from sites subject to new development or redevelopment. HDOT will study the feasibility of retrofitting construction projects, and complete at least three retrofits.

 
The consent decree for this settlement has been lodged with the federal district court by the U.S. Department of Justice and is subject to a 30-day public comment period and final court approval. A copy of the decree is available on the Department of Justice website at: http://www.justice.gov/enrd/Consent_Decrees.html

Filed Under: Streams and Rivers

About Hawaii First Water

This blog focuses on shaping water strategies for the Hawaiian Islands.

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