Douglas County is looking at collecting rain water as a means for augmentation for landscape water, according to the Denver Post. From the article, "The newest idea to find water in tapped-out Douglas County is as old as civilization: catching rain and using it later. But for this region, whose future is tied to dwindling aquifers, Colorado water law turns simple science into a process akin to the tax code. A Douglas County study to be presented Friday at a national conference at the University of Denver's Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute lays out the simple science and complex legal hurdles for letting homeowners take rainfall from their rooftops to sprinkle on their lawns...
"Colorado water law decrees rights to a share of almost every drop of river water.
Rainfall is part of that equation. If it is captured and used, the law requires the same volume must be put back in the river for downstream users. Keeping it 'would cause big problems,' said Bill Paddock, a Denver water-rights attorney, author and lecturer who formerly worked in the water unit of the state attorney general's office...
"The Colorado legislature would have to rewrite the laws, carve out exceptions for collected rainwater or create credits that compensate those with purchased water rights. 'The first thing we would have to demonstrate is that we're protecting senior water rights' downstream, said Harold Smethills, who hopes to someday develop a 2,200-acre community in northwest Douglas County engineered around such water-saving concepts.
In reality, only a fraction of rainwater on the arid Front Range makes it back to rivers, said engineer Greg Roush, one of the study's authors. Douglas County gets an annual average of 17 inches of rain, and up to 97 percent of it is lost to evaporation and vegetation. Rivers are filled by mountain snowmelt and treatment plants. Heavy deluges tend to do more harm than the water is worth, delivering costly pollutants, silt and flood damage. Capturing rain where it falls would probably save money, in the big picture, van Hemert said...
"Drains and cisterns for the average home would run more than $5,000 and save roughly the equivalent of a low-flow toilet. But combined with water- wise landscaping, it could cover 75 percent of outdoor watering needs, Smethills said...
"Rainwater has such promise that the Colorado Water Conservation Board, Douglas County, Dominion and Thunderbird water districts, Castle Pines North Metro District and Plum Valley Heights Homeowners Association paid $97,000 to study it. Backers hope to study it more, to quantify the benefits, iron out legal problems and make sure water rights are protected."
Category: Colorado Water
6:17:35 AM 
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