Bringing Conservation Landscaping to New Development: Education and Regulation

摘要

New development is booming in Central Texas. This is an area with frequent drought conditions, a limited water supply, and challenging landscape conditions. Currently, more than 60 percent of residential water goes to landscapes during the summer months. It is estimated that 80 percent of new homes will have irrigation systems. The Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) owns and operates 21 water systems in Central Texas. In addition, LCRA provides raw water to about 50 water districts and communities, more than 50 golf course and other irrigation customers, more than a dozen large industrial customers and electrical power plants and three agricultural irrigation districts in the lower Colorado River basin. The City of Austin is the largest municipal user of water from the Colorado River and has its own municipal water right. LCRA uses a combination of regulation and education to promote outdoor water conservation with retail and wholesale water customers. Previous conservation efforts, based solely on education and requests for voluntary adoption of landscape conservation measures in new development, were largely unsuccessful. Now, in unincorporated portions of the LCRA water utility service area, landscape Best Management Practices (BMP’s) in deed restrictions and restrictive covenants are used to promote conservation. Cities, that receive water from LCRA, are beginning to adopt landscape BMP’s into local ordinances. With the combination of regulation and education, area builders are beginning to install new landscapes with the potential to use water more efficiently.