This past Sunday I gave a new sermon at our UU church. It was almost impromptu, I was asked three weeks ago if I could do one based on rain. Since I teach about stormwater, I though "what the heck." I am not sure who ordered it, but it rained almost the entire weekend and we had stormwater galore.
Without further ado, here follows the sermon. I ad-libbed a bit, but kept to the outline (note the English, and grammar, etc. might not be the best).
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I have a question for everybody.
Do you sing in the shower?
or,
Do you talk to yourself in the shower out loud, have conversations with yourself?
No, don’t worry, I will not ask your partner, or your pet if you actually do that and if you sing, if you can hold a tune.
There was a time in our life that when we took a shower, we had the keep our mouths closed; our lips tightly closely together, so that the shower water could not accidentally enter our mouth. We brushed our teeth with either bottled water or water that was boiled, filtered and then treated with iodine. Our vegetables were soaked for 20 minutes in water loaded with iodine and despite all that my wife Donna got amoebic dysentery twice. “One more time” she was told, “and you will be permanently sent home to the U.S.”
Where the heck was this? Where were we?
Well, it was in Nepal, 40 years ago. Because of the overall sanitary situation at the time all waterways, streams, creeks, wells, and even springs were severely contaminated with all kinds of diseases. Water was unsafe.
We always learn that beer making was an essential part of living in the Middle Ages in Europe. Water was not safe to drink back then and the process of making, what was in those days low alcohol beer, was a way of sterilizing water and making it a safe every day or all day beverage.
Looking from space we are reminded of one of my favorite UU hymens: “Our Blue Boat Home.” The earth looks like a blue marble, showing that it is covered by oceans. Actually, the blue we can is only about 5.8% of all the water available on this earth. 94% is locked up in rock and unavailable to us, while the remaining 6% is theoretically available to us. The problem is that 5.8% is salt water and essentially undrinkable because of the salinity. There is 1.5% freshwater which is locked up in the atmosphere, soil, groundwater, glaciers, wetlands, plants, animals, rivers, lakes and streams. It is estimated that a grand total of 0.0014% of the water on earth is potentially available for human consumption. Let that sink in a bit. And that is where I come in.
Currently, I work for the State of Virginia in the Stormwater Program as a trainer in adult education. I train folks to play nice with their stormwater. One of the main issues is that once rainwater becomes runoff and enters the streams and rivers, it can easily enter saltwater and in essence become useless to us land dwellers, at least to us living here in the Tidewater. Oh, I am not saying that the animals and plants that live in the tidal areas of the Chesapeake don’t benefit from some of the runoff, but what we are seeing is that the runoff often takes a lot of stuff with it. As I tell my students the runoff is usually cloudy with sediment and sediment does not travel alone. With it you get nutrients, animal and human wastes, cigarette butts, plastics, pesticides, motor oil, dirty diapers, used tires, and all kinds of other contaminants. According to the Bible, humans were given dominion over the earth, so is this what it means? Think about that. I prefer our 7th principle that tells me that I am an equal part of the interdependent web of existence. We need to take care of the earth and that is what I try to teach.
Now the problem is that the runoff from our land is increasing. For one, our storms are getting larger as a result of global warming. Secondly, we are building more homes, mini-malls, roads, parking lots, sidewalks, you name it. All these areas are impervious to rainwater and when it rains the water needs to go somewhere, it becomes runoff. Over time we have created more runoff. Finally, forests, areas with trees and shrubs, or wildflower areas are infiltration champions. On the other hand, lawns are not. They create even more runoff. In addition, people put more fertilizer and pesticides on lawns. In other words, you can guess what the result has been over the past 70 years, more runoff and more contaminated runoff, less infiltration into the soil and a lowering of the water table. Water needed for trees, shrubs, ephemeral ponds, and shallow irrigation wells.
With the exception of James City County, Williamsburg, Smithfield and Isle of White, most of us rely on water that has been pumped to or collected in reservoirs around us. The counties that I just mentioned have to pump their drinking water out of the ground. Their water comes from a very deep layer or aquifer that is difficult to replenish. Water has to flow underground all the way from Richmond area and that may take centuries. I am sure you can imagine that reducing the infiltration in that area does not help. But we have an additional problem on top of that. Our water table or aquifer is broken, busted, kaput. This was caused by a meteor many moons ago that was big enough to create the Hampton Roads, the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, but not large enough to create mass extinctions. As a result, salty sea water can flow back up the aquifer if it is not replenished upstream, and herein lies an additional problem. It is not because of all the pumping and decreased infiltration I just spoke about! All those folks that depend on groundwater in our area are in trouble.
What can be done about this? For one, the Hampton Roads Sewer District is starting to pump treated sewer water back into the ground to replenish what we pump out and thus slow down what is called saltwater intrusion. Don’t worry. They claim it is safe, the treated sewage is sterile.
As part of my job I am working with designers, builders, locality officials, and home owners in handling stormwater where it is generated, on the property. Letting in infiltrate instead of sticking it in a roadside ditch or a pipe and sending it to a creek. This means less lawns, more rain gardens, bio-retention, permeable pavement, grass swales, you name it; infiltration is the name of the game.
Once runoff hits the creek, we lack the ability to clean up the water just like we cannot turn water into wine or into beer. We are no miracle workers. We need to start at the source, where it originates. We teach folks that they have to keep pollutants out of the water, in particular mud or what we call sediment. That is why I tell folks: Sediment does not travel alone, and we require things like those orange sediment fences and other measures around building sites, state-wide. I teach that and pollution prevention on a job site. All in an effort to keep runoff clean and infiltrate as much water as possible.
So what can you do?
Let’s think and talk about it.
1. In your yard
2. With the water that falls on your roof
3. With your vehicles
4. Your dog
5. When you play
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| A construction site down the street from my home. Another Dairy Queen! These are the guys that I teach or the guys that are inspected by folks I teach. |