From Your Lawn to the Ocean |
KCET Life & Times TranscriptAir date: Dec. 13, 2006This program is made possible in part by a grant from the City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department. Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times -- Runoff from lawn sprinklers is hurting our oceans. Can technology come to the rescue? Nancy Gardner>> I think one of the problems in the environmental room is that it's often made as difficult as possible, you know. You have to give up this, this, this and this and live a different kind of life and then everything will be fine. Well, we don't want to give up all the things we like in our lives. Val Zavala>> And then, what happens when you take a little bit of the Bard and season liberally with pop culture? You get Shakespeare according to the Troubies. It's all straight ahead on tonight's Life and Times. Announcer>> Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education. And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg. Val Zavala>> Is your lawn killing our oceans? Well, believe it or not, millions of gallons of water loaded with pesticides and fertilizer flow into our oceans every year. But now the city of Newport Beach is doing something about it. It's looking for volunteers willing to try a new high-tech satellite-controlled sprinkler system for free. As Orange County reporter, Roger Cooper, tells us, it could make a big impact on our marine environment. Roger Cooper>> Few spots on the California coast can match the beauty and serenity of Little Corona in Newport Beach. Look in any tidal pool and you can see marine life in abundance like sea anemones or hermit crabs performing Herculean feats. But the peace in this place is deceptive. Beneath the beauty, Little Corona is in real danger. The threat comes from urban runoff, the millions of gallons of water that drains down to the sea from the land. Although it hasn't rained for weeks here, the flow of water in this stream leading to the ocean is constant, all day, every day. That's because the source of this water is irrigation, urban runoff from yards. Chris Lowe>> And what happens is, as coastal development increases, people are putting in lawns and those sorts of things and have to water those lawns to keep them green. Nancy Gardner>> It's been interesting because, when we started this chapter sixteen years ago and we mentioned urban runoff, nobody cared. Nobody even knew what it was. Roger Cooper>> Nancy Gardner, who co-founded the local Surfrider chapter, has just been elected to the Newport City Council where she's begun a fight against urban runoff. Nancy Gardner>> And what's happened over the years as we've built up the watershed, we've seen what was a dry canyon with cactus become a stream that runs twenty-four hours a day, every day of the week, and the problems are several. One, that water is urban runoff and it picks up whatever is in somebody's yard, pesticides, herbicides, nutrients, animal waste. Roger Cooper>> Chris Lowe is a marine biologist at Cal State Long Beach. He says even clean fresh water is upsetting the delicate balance in the marine creatures' saltwater habitat. Chris Lowe>> Some are more tolerant to fresh water exposure than others and what happens is, as they become constantly inundated with fresh water at low tide, some of the organisms that aren't tolerant to that simply can't survive there. Roger Cooper>> The threat to marine life is so serious that the state has placed Little Corona on a list of areas of special biological significance. It's one of thirty-four places in California at such high risk. And just down the coast, Crystal Cove is on the same list. The culprit is once again urban runoff. City officials say that this is a big part of the problem, automatic sprinkler systems that aren't set properly and over-water, sending excess water heading toward the ocean as urban runoff. Newport water officer, Shannon Swaford, sees it every day. Shannon Swaford>> I drive around all day long and I see urban runoff basically watering our gutters. People stop watering their lawns and they start watering streets and a perfect example is something right over here. It's one o'clock in the afternoon and we've got a sprinkler system going off, you know, right in the middle of the day, watering the streets and the sidewalks. Roger Cooper>> If only there were a way to water more wisely. Tom Ash>> "Weather data from yesterday. There's a big time stamp from when we received the data." Roger Cooper>> Now the city of Newport Beach thinks it's found a solution. The sprinklers at Teresa Pinkston's Newport home are controlled by this box, a box with a mind of its own, that she got from the city for free. Teresa Pinkston>> Apparently, there's a computer somewhere telling it when to water and when not to. So if we have rainy weather, my sprinklers won't turn on. I suppose if there's a hot Santa Ana wind, it may water a little extra. Roger Cooper>> Known as a WeatherTRAK Smart Controller, the city chose this device because it uses data it receives each night from weather satellites. Then it dispenses water using only what plants need. Tom Ash>> It's designed to put the right amount of water onto any landscape anywhere in the country. Roger Cooper>> Tom Ash is a horticulturalist with HydroPoint, the California company that makes WeatherTRAK. Tom Ash>> And it changes that water application every day as the weather changes, so it's really designed to be perfect horticulture, good science, good water application and, out of that, we get reduced runoff, healthier plants and lower water bills. Every single station asks a series of questions. It prompts me to set the sprinkler type. We're going to set it at spray heads. Next question would be the efficiency. Yes, it's a typically average efficient irrigation system. What type of soil do I have? When I turn to review, I can actually see what the irrigation schedule is going to be at this weather. Roger Cooper>> The city of Newport is offering the Smart Controllers to five hundred residents at no cost. It's funded with a three hundred thousand dollar grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. City Council member, NLife ancy Gardner, likes the fact that this smart sprinkler program is voluntary for citizens. Nancy Gardner>> When you explain to people, you know, this is what you're doing. You may not even be aware that you're doing it, and this is the impact, most people want to do the right thing. And if you can make it easy for them -- I mean, I think one of the problems in the environmental room is often that it's made as difficult as possible. You have to give up this, this, this and this and live a different kind of life and then everything will be fine. Well, we don't want to give up all the things we like in our lives and this is the way that we can do it with virtually no effort. It's paying even less attention to our garden in some ways than we do now. Roger Cooper>> The hope is that the smart boxes can help the city meet an order from the Regional Water Board, a mandate to cut down urban runoff going to Little Corona and to Crystal Cove. An earlier study is promising. Tom Ash>> The studies have shown, with this technology, WeatherTRAK was actually installed in communities in Irvine in a large study with all the local public agencies and fifty to seventy percent of the runoff coming out of those neighborhoods was eliminated. That also told the scientists that fifty to seventy percent of the pollutants that were in that water didn't make it to the beach, so the impact could be tremendous. Roger Cooper>> The free boxes are proving to be popular. City officials expect all five hundred will be snapped up in short order. City officials will be measuring the impact with hopes of expanding the program to even more homes. In the meantime, somewhere in some tidal pool, the marine creatures will be resting a bit easier because a smart sprinkler linked to a satellite is looking out for them. In Newport Beach, I'm Roger Cooper for Life and Times. |
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