PORT TOWNSEND — Water conservation is a short-term issue that could signal a long-term behavioral change, a business audience was told on Monday.
“We can take voluntary water conservation measures now but they won’t have a significant effect,” City Manager David Timmons told about 60 people gathered for a Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce luncheon on Monday.
“But it will help us to condition ourselves and understand what we will need to do in the future.”
Timmons said that drought conditions have seriously depleted the city’s water supply.
Port Townsend draws water from the Big Quilcene and Little Quilcene rivers that is fed into two reservoirs before being transported by pipe for 30 miles to the city filtration system.
“If these are going to be our normal weather conditions, we are going to start making some changes in our behavior,” Timmons said.
Timmons showed photographs taken in 2014 and 2015 of the same area above the Quilcene River, the first covered in snow and the second completely green.
“The snowpack has been our primary storage reservoir,” he said.
“It feeds into the river when the river’s water level decreases,” he said.
“We don’t have that backup now.”
Increased rain in Port Townsend won’t do much to change the situation, Timmons said.
To improve matters, “it needs to rain in Quilcene,” he said.
Timmons said that residential customers consume about 10 percent of the water from the reservoirs while the remainder is for industrial uses — specifically Port Townsend Paper Corp.
The city uses less than 2 million gallons per day, according to Public Works Director Ken Clow, while the mill recently cut its consumption from 15 million to 10 million gallons daily, according to General Manager Carr Tyndall.
Both the city and the mill recognize the need for more conservation measures.
Tyndall said the water shortage could require a longer shutdown period while Timmons said increased industrial conservation measures are necessary to ensure an adequate water supply beyond Nov. 1 of this year.
The current supply would last the city two or three years if it were not replenished.
With the mill in operation, it would last only about 120 days, Timmons said.
The water shortage increases fire danger.
“We are very concerned about what’s going to happen here,” Timmons said.
“While you were all enjoying the fireworks over the weekend, I had my phone in my hand waiting for it to go off and hoping there won’t be a fire.”
A severe fire could affect the mill since it could decrease water quality which would impede operations “because clean water is needed to produce paper.”
A severe fire also could change the business climate in East Jefferson County, he said.
“I recommend that we all do some contingency planning as to what we will do as businesses if we lost a major section of the forest and the economic impact of losing a major employer because of that,” he said.
“A fire in our watershed could seriously change our water quality in the future.”
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.