Salon Five – Rosey Jencks on Water
Thursday, January 14th – 2010, 6pm
The topic of our January Salon (the fifth on our series) was on water. Water is perhaps the biggest, and yet least understood, environmental crisis we are facing. Right now, 1.1 billion people (that’s a sixth of the planet), does not have access to clean drinking water. By 2035, it is estimated that up to two-thirds of the planet will be in the same sad state.
What most people do not realize is that water is finite. All of the water currently on the planet is the only water ever on the planet. The water in that lemonade you’re drinking was once rain falling on dinosaurs. We don’t make new water, nor do we get new water from outer space. Every drop of water on the planet as been here since the beginning.
Water is in a constant state of flux, changing from liquid to solid to gas, and back again. It moves around the planet as clouds, rain, rivers or in underground streams. The very water you are drinking might have been consumed by Thomas Jefferson at one point. In this very real way, water connects all of the life on the planet.
Nearly all of the water on the planet (97%) is in the oceans and undrinkable. Another 2 percent of it is inaccessibly frozen in the polar ice caps (though not for long). That leaves the remaining one percent available for people to drink. Sadly, 70 percent of that one percent is polluted. That is reason for things like the One Percent Exhibit or the great work of organizations like 1% Water and Charity Water . It is also the reason we wanted to discuss it in our Salon Series.
To lead our discussion, we called on Rosey Jencks, leader of the Urban Watershed Management and Stormwater Planning Program for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC). Rosey began the talk with a detailed presentation on the stormwater plan for the City of San Francisco, which hopes to be a model for cities around the country.
The term “stormwater” refers to all of the water dumped into the landscape from the roof, parking lot or streets during and after a rainstorm. In an urban setting, this stormwater must be controlled and directed safely, but we must also be careful to avoid polluting the water while doing it. The room was filled with some of the leading thinkers, including architects, planners and researchers, and yet everyone learned something new about these water issues.
Proposed to be added to the San Francisco Green Building Ordinance, managing stormwater is now required for anyone building more than 5000 square feet. This move views stormwater as a precious resource, not to be wasted. These types of regulations also open opportunities for urban agriculture and embrace the local Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) movement, such as Farm Fresh to You, Live Power Community Farm (http://www.livepower.org) or Marin Sun Farms.
The SFPUC’s proposed Stormwater Management Ordinance has yet to be adopted into law, but Ms. Jencks is hopeful. We here at Urban Re:Vision support the ordinance and feel more needs to be done to protect our limited water supply.
Remember, you can survive without electricity; you can’t last more than a few days without fresh water.
SIDEBAR:
Our Executive Director, Eric Corey Freed, was recently interviewed about water issues. Listen here:
