To fight drought, Georgians get creative

A roof, two tanks, and a pump are key tools for one Atlantan's do-it-yourself rain harvesting.

from the December 19, 2007 edition

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"[The drought] has been a real gestalt change for the residents of Georgia," says Rich Clark, a political scientist at the University of Georgia in Athens, who conducted the Peach State Poll.

Metro Atlanta went from having almost no rain harvesters to more than three dozen in the past year, says Snellville, Ga.-based Paul Morgan, one of the main Georgia suppliers of rain collection systems. "People are starting to realize this is not a weather problem, it's a population problem," says Mr. Morgan.

A rain harvesting system for drinking water costs about $20,000, most of which goes to special gutters, pumps, filters, and storage. Backyard tanks are one option, but the system can be made completely invisible with the use of a basement cistern – often a lined concrete tank.

Experts say a 1,200 square-foot house can collect 750 gallons during a one-inch rain. During this Georgia drought, that equals 22,500 gallons a year, or 61 gallons per day. (An average shower takes about 20 gallons, the same as a modern washing machine requires.) During a normal rain year in Georgia, a home cistern for the same small house could provide 110 gallons a day.

"People are just now realizing that water collection is an alternative to a municipal water system," says Greg Whitfield, the owner of Rain Well, a catchment contractor in Arlington, Texas.

One big-picture plan for Atlanta involves building a new state reservoir, but that could take 15 years and is complicated by prohibitive land prices and environmental concerns. Discussions are also under way to transfer water from the Tennessee River into some North Georgia towns to save more water from Lanier for Atlanta's needs.

While the state is not currently considering incentives for rainwater collection systems, the idea is beginning to draw attention. Channel 26, Atlanta's government TV channel, recently approached Carr about doing a segment on a contraption he built, it turns out, not to save the world, but because he couldn't afford city water.

Cisterns, of course, are one of man's original inventions, but they largely became obsolete with the advent of municipal water systems. Today, however, they're back in vogue in places such as California, Arizona, and New Mexico, where low rainfall and worries about aquifers have prompted states to offer tax incentives and rebates to homeowners to build personal rain harvesters. Even President Bush collects rainwater for irrigation at his Texas ranch.

The total number of home cisterns is not known, according to the American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association (ARCSA) in Austin, Texas, but a new certification program introduced this year graduated 30 contractors, says Belinda McGhee, spokeswoman for ARCSA. Environmentally friendly building codes are driving the trend, too, she says.

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