5/18: Initial Thoughts

We as Americans are being spoiled in terms of water supply and its quality. For most people in this country, we can use water almost unlimitedly, for fractions of pennies at a time. Not to mention, the usual sole source of water coming into our homes is perfectly suitable for drinking at any faucet output. For a variety of reasons though, we now over-exaggerate the quality of water in our homes. Much more is wasted when a false light is shed on our drinking water, and people are scared into believing waste water is similar to some deadly chemical. We are in the habit of letting faucets run without reason, flushing the toilet every time anyone urinates or even disposes a tissue in the bowl, and let our hoses run for hours watering our overly large yards.

Keith Hall's novel idea of utilizing the rainwater that spills off our roof, into gutters, yards, and streets inches at a time is a brilliant one in my opinion. Implementation aside, I would like to focus on the immense benefits that would come from rainwater storage and re-use. Considering only a small portion of the water our municipalities across the nation spend much time and energy resources bringing up to a standard suitable for drinking, actually makes it to the dinner table, why not use natural rainwater for the portion we do waste our potable drinking water on. Being able to capture and manage stormwater to use in an efficient manner, and at times we deem appropriate and to meet demand efficiently instead of the natural way in which stormwater reaches the land and disperses without us being able to control it. This is one way we can control the environment in a positive manner so long as we let water still run its natural course and provide nutrients and moisture to the land in a necessary amount to allow for natural life to flourish.

Being able to prevent pollution and incorporate rainwater into our current systems with less waste would be a great direction for sustainability. As with other efforts, rainwater management has a systemic impact and would reverberate in other areas of sustainability. I believe this area would do a lot for our environment in many areas of sustainability and hope that we continue moving in the direction of utilizing water falling from the sky.