Ep. 2 - All About Water - With Peter Mayer, Urban Water Expert

Ep. 2 - Peter Mayer

[00:00:00] Rajeev: Hello and welcome to episode 2 of Politics, Ecology, and Everything Else in Between, and I'm your host, Rajiv. Today, we are going to talk about water. Water is essential for all life forms and human development. Our lives depend on it. Sometimes our livelihoods depend on it too. With climate change, the supply of water has the potential to influence geopolitics, diplomacy, and even conflict.

[00:00:26] Rajeev: To discuss this very topic, I am talking to Peter Mayer from Boulder, Colorado. Long time friend of Madurai, my hometown, and an expert in the science of water management. He heads an organization called WaterDM. Over his career, Peter has worked with hundreds of water utilities and organizations across the US and Canada.

[00:00:48] Rajeev: So, without further ado, cue music.

[00:00:52] Rajeev: [00:01:00] So, hello, Peter. Welcome to the show. Hello. Hey, Peter. It's been a while since we've been in touch. So, just to begin with, for our listeners, could we start with a brief intro about yourself and what you do?

[00:01:17] Peter Mayer: Sure. So, my name is Peter Mayer. I'm a professional engineer. I have a degree in civil engineering, and my specialty is in water resources, and particularly in water management, and on the demand side of water management.

[00:01:37] Peter Mayer: So I got interested. First in water when I was living in India, actually in Madurai, and that decided I needed to get a technical degree in order to pursue a career in water. And so I got my civil engineering degree and then I ended up studying where people use water as part of my master's research and using [00:02:00] small devices.

[00:02:01] Peter Mayer: called data loggers that record the flow of water as it enters the house through the water meter. And then we are able to, to then use computers to, to interpret that high frequency flow data and actually measure water use inside the house, including toilet flushes and clothes washer machines and dishwashers, faucets and showers and irrigation systems.

[00:02:26] Peter Mayer: And to break all these different water uses into categories and quantify them for the. for the, uh, accurately for the first time. So that really launched my career. I started doing that type of research for water utilities, and it's really led to a variety of different interesting projects and things that I've worked on over the years, including testifying at the U S Supreme court as an expert in, uh, municipal and urban water use on behalf of the state of Georgia, where I understand you used to live.

[00:02:56] Peter Mayer: And so they're actually still, uh, Georgia and Florida are [00:03:00] still engaged in a, in a legal dispute over, over the river, and I was hired as the expert from Georgia. So, I, I view, I have a lot to, to say about water, and I'm interested to have a discussion with you. Interesting.

[00:03:14] Rajeev: So Peter, how did Madurai inspire your interest in water?

[00:03:18] Rajeev: Well,

[00:03:19] Peter Mayer: my first thought was that I wanted to do international development work that I really uh, Amanda and I my wife Amanda We really enjoyed living abroad. And so that's initially what we thought we would we wanted to do And I determined that the water was the most one of the most critical resource issues.

[00:03:36] Peter Mayer: It was just so obvious and really Living in mother, I really brought it to the surface. You see the river that would dry up every year, essentially go from some points being bank to bank and then other points just being completely dry trickle and then also the groundwater changes and everybody is constantly worried about groundwater levels, seawater intrusion, so many issues related to [00:04:00] water and so that, and then, you know, when I also think back at it, I also had an inspiration from my childhood.

[00:04:06] Peter Mayer: A man named Gilbert White, who was a family friend who was really one of the most eminent floodplain scholars and researchers. And so he lived in Boulder. And so, so I, there's sort of these combination of factors led me, I would say in, into it, but it was pure chance that I ended up studying water use and then how everything else kind of emerged.

[00:04:30] Peter Mayer: I'm a real believer in sort of, you have to. Seize opportunities. You never know where opportunities might exist.

[00:04:38] Rajeev: Absolutely. So the first question that I have for you comes from one of the James Bond films.

[00:04:46] Peter Mayer: Ahahahahaha! Bum ba dum bum bum bum bum bum ba dum bum ba da

[00:04:50] Rajeev: da da da!

[00:04:51] Peter Mayer: Yeah,

[00:04:53] Rajeev: ahahaha! So this, in 2008 there was a film came out, uh, called, uh, Quantum of Solace.

[00:04:59] Rajeev: It starred, I [00:05:00] mean, it's a James Bond film, and, um Daniel Craig. Daniel Craig, yes. And he's pitted against an evil criminal syndicate. It's bent on global domination, right? So typical of a James Bond film. But the twist here is This evil syndicate, or the evil criminal behind it, is actually plotting to seize control of Bolivia's water supply.

[00:05:25] Peter Mayer: Of the country of Bolivia.

[00:05:26] Rajeev: Right. We talk about water as the next oil. So, does it sound like, uh, familiar to you?

[00:05:35] Peter Mayer: Yes, yes, yes, and, and, and like, so there's some similarities actually, you know, between water and oil, and, and, so the first thing would be the physicality, I mean, like, like oil, water is this is, It's a physical, it's a liquid substance, although it can take all, you know, three different states.

[00:05:56] Peter Mayer: So transporting it is a big deal, and it's very [00:06:00] expensive. And so in order to make it worthwhile to, you know, transport it long distances, you have to pretty much value it similarly to oil, otherwise it doesn't make economic sense. The, the unlike oil though, I mean, what we see about oil is found in many places of the world, but not all places.

[00:06:18] Peter Mayer: Water is pretty much found almost everywhere, even under deserts, but there are truly, in the world, water rich places and very water poor, water scarce places. Right.

[00:06:30] Rajeev: So that's where your whole hydro politics comes into play, right?

[00:06:35] Peter Mayer: Yeah, because you don't always have People settling and choosing to live in the place where the water is, although that generally has been once again, if you look at the scope of human history, water is pretty much determined where people have been able to sell.

[00:06:50] Peter Mayer: And it's also, but they think perhaps ended. So from the big level, there, there are some water resources which are shared by nations. [00:07:00] And so India and China share the Himalayas, and with Nepal, you know, other countries. So the water resources there could obviously need to be shared. And there, and in Pakistan, there could be disputes.

[00:07:14] Peter Mayer: When you have those type of Boundaries, international boundaries that, that separate the water, the water resources. But as we both know from our experience in India, the politics of water get much more local than that. And in many ways, the most bitter conflicts that we see are longstanding conflicts of water tend to be somewhat more local than we've seen.

[00:07:37] Peter Mayer: We, as opposed to nations fighting, it's much more like states or. Provinces fighting or regions or counties that are fighting or maybe even individual water users who are fighting against each other over who has, you know, the right to the Calvary, the Colorado, the Apalachicola, whatever the source of

[00:07:58] Rajeev: water.

[00:07:59] Rajeev: Right. Yeah. In [00:08:00] fact, I was just reading up for this podcast and I was looking at, of course, the closest dispute that comes. To my mind is the Kaveri River and incidentally it started off in 1892 because the, it was back then that was the Mysore Maharaja, it was a separate state. Yeah. The Madras Presidency was controlled by the British.

[00:08:25] Peter Mayer: Yes.

[00:08:27] Rajeev: And incidentally, Kaveri originates in the Coorg, which is in Karnataka

[00:08:31] Peter Mayer: now. Right, and so did they dam it? Did they block off the

[00:08:34] Rajeev: Kaveri? Yeah, so that's That's where that whole thing comes. And then, uh, that's where it started. Yeah. That's where it started, I think. And in, I think in the 19, the start of the 19 hundreds, I think these guys wanted to dam upstream and the Brits objected.

[00:08:52] Peter Mayer: Yeah. For good reason. But they, uh, were ultimately unsuccessful. They did dam the Cauvery and it did result has resulted in ceaseless [00:09:00] conflict ever since then. Have you, did you ever see the Cauvery flow bank to bank? Yeah. Cause I went there every time I went there, it was just this giant dry desert looking thing.

[00:09:09] Peter Mayer: And I was just so big. I'd love to see that thing full of water. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:09:16] Rajeev: So, I mean, this has been going on for years and years. So right now we are also looking at. Water scarcity, right? Climate change, also water contamination due to climate change.

[00:09:27] Peter Mayer: Well, humans, yeah, we've contaminated the water, mostly because of human stupidity and ignorance.

[00:09:35] Rajeev: So, I mean, how does climate change come into play? Because I was reading that because the sea levels are rising and most of the cities are on the coast, right? And because the sea level is rising, the seawater is pushing into the water table. And the water's becoming more saline?

[00:09:54] Peter Mayer: That's one of the, that's one of the issues that's happening.

[00:09:57] Peter Mayer: I think where I live here in, in [00:10:00] Colorado in the United States, the front lines of climate change are, is happening on the Colorado River. Colorado River originates here in Colorado and also in Wyoming and Utah, and then flows down through, through Arizona and Nevada and provides a lot of water to California.

[00:10:19] Peter Mayer: And it, the two largest reservoirs in the United States, Lake Powell and Lake Mead are there, and currently, the combined contents of those two massive reservoirs is about 40%, standing just over 40 percent of capacity, and another dry winter, so we're, so what we're seeing, I think, from climate change is The, uh, river that, that previously was able to produce enough, there was enough snowpack and there was enough melt off that would occur annually, and that is not occurring anymore.

[00:10:55] Peter Mayer: And now the usage has caught up, and we're seeing an imbalance, and it's, [00:11:00] it's coming very fast, uh, faster than people realize. On the order of 5, 10, 15 years, we, we could see severe impacts. Yeah, I

[00:11:09] Rajeev: mean, I can see it in Auckland, because Auckland, uh, we've been, water scarcity is very real, and the local water body is constantly advertising to make people have shorter showers.

[00:11:22] Peter Mayer: Well, is Auckland, does Auckland rely on snow melt? How does Auckland get its water supply?

[00:11:26] Rajeev: I think there's a, no, it doesn't, I don't think it relies on water melt. There's a local reservoir

[00:11:32] Peter Mayer: here. Yeah, but that water for the reservoir has to come from somewhere. Does it come from the mountains, or? Possibly.

[00:11:38] Peter Mayer: Possibly. Okay, so this is important. Most people don't even know where their water comes from. Exactly. Exactly.

[00:11:45] Rajeev: I mean, I'm, okay, it's in point. So, I mean, what do you think are the steps that we need to take to combat all this? Like, what are the, I mean, climate change is real, but obviously we have to adapt to it.

[00:11:58] Rajeev: So, one thing is [00:12:00] possibly we need to make lifestyle changes, number one. And possibly the way we use water or reuse water, maybe? I don't know. Like, what are the options do

[00:12:10] Peter Mayer: we have? Well, we have a lot of options. It's a very interesting situation. So let's, first thing is to realize that the water supply is limited and that, you know, what you have And you need to, you also need to establish the volume of water that you're going to have each year.

[00:12:27] Peter Mayer: And if you don't have enough, then you may not be able to have, to do all the things, or have all the people that you'd originally perhaps envisioned that you wanted to have. There's tough choices associated with water. But in terms of what things we can actually do, let's just think about it from like, here we are.

[00:12:44] Peter Mayer: We're in this pickle and we'll do everything we can to slow down climate change, but it's inevitable. We're going to see reduced water available water. So the first thing we have to do is manage. The groundwater extremely carefully. Groundwater is going to be this precious resource [00:13:00] that can help as a backup.

[00:13:02] Peter Mayer: But if we use it all up, that's it. I mean, especially if surface water become very irregular, the groundwater. It needs to be managed in a, in, in very carefully so that it does not, it does not get exhausted and we need to work on replenishing it. We also need to focus on storage of in groundwater. Most of the future of water storage, I do not think is going to be in surface water reservoirs like we have.

[00:13:28] Peter Mayer: I think we, I think most of the future of water storage will be underground. In, in, uh, through aquifer storage, because first of all, it's a lot less environmentally damaging, and then you also eliminate evaporation, and so many times, and they're going to need to figure out ways to store water in aquifers when you have flooding, so trying to take advantage of these maybe more extreme events that are going to occur someplace, so the water doesn't all go away, that somehow you find a way to capture it.

[00:13:59] Peter Mayer: Store [00:14:00] it underground. Hopefully, you know, some people are some places are working that are doing aquifer storage right now. Very successfully. It requires the proper geography. All right, so that's the first thing. Groundwater management. Then thinking going up from there. We need to think that surface water and this is the water from lakes and reservoirs and all that.

[00:14:17] Peter Mayer: It's going to become much less Uh huh. Or much more irregular, I would say, and so we need to consider, you may, you could build a new reservoir, you may not have enough water to fill that new reservoir all the time, so is it worth spending all that money to, to build? That's the other beauty of the underground storage.

[00:14:36] Peter Mayer: So, from the more personal perspective, water is very local, so there are going to be parts, and people, and places where there really is an ample water supply, where you're probably, don't need to worry nearly as much about where you're, whether there's going to be enough water in the future. Those are probably the places where we'd like more people to live in the future.

[00:14:57] Peter Mayer: Unfortunately, I'm not sure that's what's really happening, but you know, [00:15:00] you can think along the Mississippi River. There's, there are gigantic bodies of water, the Great Lakes, the, there are places that, that are fairly water rich. Conversely, there are also places that are very water scarce and places like Arizona, I'm talking mostly to the U.

[00:15:17] Peter Mayer: S. United States references, but in the Middle East, certainly Jordan and much of the Middle East is tremendously water scarce. They're going to rely on desalination. I haven't gotten into that. Although I want to finish the more basic water stuff. So you got to consider surface water. Snowpack is going to be less.

[00:15:35] Peter Mayer: You might get more rainfall, it might come more intensely, it's going to be unevenly distributed. You got to think about how that all these different things and how you might take advantage of it. You got to use less water. So in cities and towns and we've done a really good job of this overall and we've actually in in many parts of the world including Australia and New Zealand put into place codes and standards that have reduced the [00:16:00] flush volume of Toilets so that you can't buy an inefficient fixture anymore.

[00:16:04] Peter Mayer: Clothes washers are more water efficient and energy efficient. So we've succeeded in starting to drive down consumption. We're still working on outdoor urban usage. I think that's the, we still have a lot of issues in place. People's places where you have green lawns and swimming pools and amenities that may just not make sense to have in certain places.

[00:16:28] Peter Mayer: But then there's this bigger picture of water that's used in cities. And water that's also used in farms and for agriculture that's relying on the same water source. And so like in Colorado, agriculture uses about 85 percent or 90 percent of all of the water in the state. The cities are only using 10 percent.

[00:16:51] Peter Mayer: So a comparatively small transfer of water from farms to cities could Put the cities in a comfortable position [00:17:00] for a hundred years or more. How you manage that and what that looks like and what that does to agriculture is a big question, but that's a true, that's a similar story to a lot of places, and I think you're going to see that, that the one time where water does flow uphill, it up flows uphill to money.

[00:17:18] Peter Mayer: And the money is usually in the cities where people, if they want the water, they will have come up with the money to buy it from somewhere else, hopefully not from too far away. The thing we're starting to see is proposals for very long pipelines, essentially giant straws with pumps and very energy intensive.

[00:17:37] Peter Mayer: That to me is not good planning. I think it's much better to think about the resources that you have. locally, and to try to plan your community to rely on what you have available locally. And if it's not enough, then you just shouldn't maybe be as big or grow to be as much as so you outgrow your water supply.

[00:17:57] Peter Mayer: So

[00:17:57] Rajeev: I mean, going back to agriculture, but this [00:18:00] agriculture uses so much water, do you think the farming practices, all that has to change in order to adapt to the, the most scarce water kind of situation?

[00:18:11] Peter Mayer: I think it does. I think it will have to change. I'm more optimistic about that. I don't know why. Maybe because I know less about it.

[00:18:19] Peter Mayer: But it strikes me that we, that we have the capacity to plan agriculture and think about agriculture perhaps on a bigger, more macro scale. Think about if water becomes Truly, this particularly scarce resource and we can optimize where we're growing different types of crops. In Colorado, we grow a lot of alfalfa, which is then fed to animals.

[00:18:45] Peter Mayer: A lot of it is exported even. So, you know, that might not be the highest and best use of the Colorado River water at some point. And so I, this is where you would think maybe the free market and economics might help. Determine what [00:19:00] really, you know, what, unfortunately, what may happen is the water becomes this commodity.

[00:19:03] Peter Mayer: And so then it gets removed from the farm. And that's not good because there's a lot of benefits to irrigated, irrigated lands. And we need to feed people. So, so we, it's not like you cannot, you can't just say, Oh, we're not going to do that anymore. No, we have to keep doing, we have to keep doing agriculture.

[00:19:18] Peter Mayer: There's no question about it. We just got to do it more efficiently. And I'm hopeful that that's possible. But it's got to be done very carefully through through identifying the best lands that you don't want to remove. And you know, then maybe which ones it makes more sense to, to occasionally fallow or to take some water.

[00:19:36] Peter Mayer: It's tough though. It's, that's a tough call, but it's that I see that as an essential movement worldwide as cities grow.

[00:19:44] Rajeev: Do you influence policy? I mean, as a professional, do you influence policymaking? Like do you lobby with? What do you do to help your local governments, state governments to influence policy in order to make these changes?

[00:19:55] Rajeev: So,

[00:19:56] Peter Mayer: that's a very good question. So, I'm, my career, [00:20:00] I'm a consultant and I would have to answer yes, I do try to influence policy. But, from a variety of different Perspectives and ways over the years. So just at the most local level, I advocated very strongly for a conservation oriented water rate structure for our own utility to make sure that we build for water in a way that, that rewards people who are efficient.

[00:20:24] Peter Mayer: And makes people who are inefficient pay more. And it's cool, because it's a water budget system. So it's actually based on your own landscape and the size of your own yard. And so if you have a bigger yard, you get a little bigger allotment for outdoor use. Anyway, but, so that's something. And then also, I have I've worked for many years as a senior advisor to the, uh, an organization called the Alliance for Water Efficiency, which advocates for water efficiency programs and policies at a national level, because that's actually very important.

[00:20:55] Peter Mayer: That's how we've achieved a lot of the savings in the urban sector and the [00:21:00] municipal sectors through policy and code changes, things that mandated flush volumes for toilets and maximum set, maximum flow rates. And then also through voluntary programs like we have this voluntary program called WaterSense.

[00:21:15] Peter Mayer: I think Australia has one too with like WaterStars or something. But anyway, they rate, you basically essentially approve. products that are water efficient or more water efficient than other ones. And so it helps when you go to the store to buy something, it's obvious, Oh, well, that one uses less water.

[00:21:31] Peter Mayer: I'm gonna, it's got the label on it. So those things actually should make a big difference. And the easiest savings, the easiest water savings to get in the urban sector are things that, that don't require behavior changes. You mentioned taking a shorter shower. That to me is one of the hardest things to get people to do.

[00:21:49] Peter Mayer: Because who will be a shower is one of those. Pleasures of life. He get a hot shower. A mother is a difference where you don't have a hot shower. You're just dumping it on your head. [00:22:00] Then a short shower is not a problem. But if you have the luxury of hot water, that you've spent a lot of money for your hot water.

[00:22:06] Peter Mayer: It's unlikely you're going to really restrict that, but. Changing the flush volume of your toilet, as long as it does the job as well, who cares? So, and similarly with a clothes washer or a dishwasher, as long as you're getting the service that that device is providing, you don't really care how much water it's using.

[00:22:25] Peter Mayer: So, those are where it's much easier, so those are the kind of things where it's much easier to get the water signals, that's why the codes and standards have been sold. So important. Um, and so now it's just a question of getting all of, it takes a long time to get all the old fixtures and appliances turned over.

[00:22:39] Peter Mayer: And so that everyone has efficient stuff. But once that happens and you should have a pretty efficient population, new development, you know, as new buildings are built because of the rules, they'll be built efficient to begin with a lot of the work that we've had to do. And throughout my career in water conservation is going back into old buildings.

[00:22:58] Peter Mayer: Putting new, you know, new [00:23:00] fixtures in them because the old ones are so water inefficient. I mean, you reach a point where, you know, you sort of squeeze the lemon and then you have to wonder, can we really grow? I don't believe that we can continue to have our population just go expansive through expansive growth.

[00:23:16] Peter Mayer: I think we need to really have take a hard look at the big picture for the globe and what the planet is capable

[00:23:23] Rajeev: of sustaining. So that leads me to my next question. For fossil fuels, Peter, we have an alternative now, which is like electric vehicles instead of fossil fuel driven vehicles. But what's the alternative to fresh water?

[00:23:39] Rajeev: There's no

[00:23:40] Peter Mayer: alternative for water. The closest thing would be desalinization, where you basically turn electricity and salt water into drinking water. And so if you live on the coast, and, and let's just say that we can't, we get off of fossil fuels and we find, you know, we're able to use solar or other.

[00:23:57] Peter Mayer: sources, renewable sources, so that, you know, [00:24:00] generating electricity is not a problem. Then desalinization would actually probably make a lot more sense. Today, if we're just going to burn more fossil fuels to desalinate water, it's just insanity. We're just making everything worse and worse. So, so, the interesting thing, you know, because it's one of those ones where, you know, a technological breakthrough could change everything.

[00:24:23] Peter Mayer: And if there is, if we could find a low energy form of desalinization, you know, that would make a big difference for a lot of places in the world. But as it is right now, you have to pump, you know, the water back and forth through these membranes. It's just, it's very energy intensive. They site the plants right next to a power plant, usually, because they're planning on using, you know, all the electricity that they can generate.

[00:24:47] Rajeev: Yeah, it sounds very counterproductive

[00:24:50] Peter Mayer: to me. Well, it's a bit like the plans to, oh, we're going to send a, put a pipeline to that gigantic river over there, the Mississippi river, whatever river [00:25:00] is a thousand miles away and bring in the water to the, that's like, we got to pump that water all that way.

[00:25:04] Peter Mayer: There's all of that associated energy, not to mention all of the maintenance and stuff. It's just, it's why not just move the people over by that river? Right.

[00:25:14] Rajeev: Right. And just. Closing thoughts on what do we need to do as, as individuals in order to conserve our footprint? Yes,

[00:25:22] Peter Mayer: that's a, that's a really good question.

[00:25:24] Peter Mayer: So as I think we all have a responsibility in our own community to, to use water efficiently. And that responsibility varies depending on where we live. But if you live in a water scarce area, then you have a much greater responsibility. And when, so that can start by just making sure you don't have leaks.

[00:25:41] Peter Mayer: Leaks are a big problem. The research that I've done on residential water use show that leaks are typically about 10 percent of indoor usage. They happen infrequently. It's the kind of thing that's like, not everybody has a bad leak, but a few people have these real big ones. I'm hopeful that technology will help us and give us [00:26:00] alerts and ways of finding leaks, but as individuals, that would be, I think, the easiest thing everybody could do to just to pay more attention.

[00:26:07] Peter Mayer: When you have an old toilet and you see water running into it or something. It's probably leaking hundreds of gallons a day, and that adds up when you multiply it by all the households in the community. So that's the first thing. Then there's the outdoor water use. If you have, if you use water outdoors, that's where you really gotta think.

[00:26:25] Peter Mayer: That's water, that's your use, that's Really discretionary. I mean, if so, if it's like a wet year, if you live in a climate where, you know, we have big variations like where I do some years, it's perfectly fine. We have plenty of water and it makes a lot of sense that we can water the yard. We can have gardens.

[00:26:42] Peter Mayer: Not all years, though, I think, is that going to be possible in the future. I think we have to accept the fact that outdoor use may be curtailed in some years. And that's really where I see climate change. It's happened in the past. During droughts, I think it's just going to become more and more [00:27:00] frequent.

[00:27:00] Peter Mayer: So, one of the things I've been working on is to help Figure out how utilities can manage those curtailment periods in a way that's more equitable. And so that, that how the people are able to manage their usage in a way that, that, that makes more sense. So instead of telling them, maybe you can only water three days a week, you tell them you have 5, 000 gallons that you can use.

[00:27:19] Peter Mayer: And here's a measurement, here's, you know, how you can tell how much water you're using, then you can choose to use the water however you want. So anyway, those are kind of the things, but it's very important. Water use, ultimately all, we all use water and it all comes down to us at the end. And collective action is what's really accomplished so much so far in water conservation.

[00:27:41] Peter Mayer: We really have done a remarkable job reducing per capita use worldwide without making huge sacrifices. So we gotta, we gotta, we have more work to do, but we have made some

[00:27:50] Rajeev: progress. That was a fascinating conversation, Peter. Thanks for sharing your expertise and your time.

[00:27:57] Peter Mayer: My pleasure, Rajiv. You know, it's, it's [00:28:00] great talking with you and happy to do it again sometime.

[00:28:02] Outro: So that's the end of episode number two, my friends. I hope you enjoyed it. I definitely did bringing it to you. You can send us your feedback and questions by clicking on the voice message link on our website, anchor. fm forward slash politicsetc. That is anchor. fm forward slash politicsetc. Till the next episode, peace out.