I was at the Air and Waste Management Association luncheon today and Dr. Carol Couch, the director of the GA Environmental Protection Division (GAEPD), gave the keynote. Below are excerpts from her speech and my comments:

She says crux of the recent Lake Lanier (GA) water ruling is that Army Corp of Engineers (COE) hasn't been operating properly for last 50 years. Ruling was in response to lawsuits against the Corp. There are 40 Corp projects in 28 other states also not in compliance according to ruling.

comment: These projects will likely be [adversely] affected by the precedent set by the ruling.

She states that all lawsuits are against the Corp, not Atlanta or GA, due to their misappropriation of the lake.

comment: This is of course in direct contradiction to EVERYTHING we've seen in the press about the water wars.

Most criticism leveled at GA in the wars is focused on Atlanta's water waste; however, less than 1% of water from the Chattahoochee is diverted for water use in Atlanta. Also, water use in Atlanta is comparatively low. Per capita water use is 151 gal/person/day; in Macon, it's 250. Only 5 metropolitan areas per capita water use is less than Atlanta's.

comment: She says these figures are obtained from simply dividing water use by population. It sounds like bullshit to me; installed capacity divided by City population gives you 390 gallons per person per day. EPD doesn't grant water permits willy nilly (as she would know), so how can she logically disassociate installed capacity from consumed amount?

Governor Purdue has a four prong strategy to deal with the ruling:
> Appeal
> Negotiate with AL and FL governors
> Form private industry-led task force to study how to deal with loss of Lake Lanier drinking water capacity; however, she says they don't realistically think they can replace the lake. Reservoirs are too environmentally destructive with too much legislation. She notes that 1/3 cost of a recent reservoir was environmental mitigation.

comment: I didn't hear the one she named, but I think she means this one in Marietta.

> Greater progress on water conservation and efficiency

She says GA is currently implementing 2007 statewide water mgt plan. Under this plan, all areas have mandate to develop a regional watershed mgt plan.

comment: The idea is to develop cooperative water management plans that take it account the needs of neighboring towns and neighboring ecologies.

She says that conservation is a priority but we still need more reservoirs. Conservation is not the silver bullet; it will be weighed against economic evaluations of other ideas.

Paraphrase: "Education and collective conscience are more impactful than regulation."
Quote: "What's in our hearts cannot be regulated."

comment: WTF?! She basically concluded a pretty fact-driven, unbiased speech with anti-regulation propaganda.