SUSTAINABILITY REPORT: Hey Las Vegas, it's the water - News

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Oct. 14, 2008
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

SUSTAINABILITY REPORT: Hey Las Vegas, it's the water

Despite some progress, city drops in greenness survey

By ALAN CHOATE
REVIEW-JOURNAL

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SustainLane survey

ANOTHER TREE GROWS IN LV

With minor fanfare, city of Las Vegas officials added another tree to the City Hall grounds Monday to call attention to a new urban forestry program.

It was the first of six planned events. The program is aimed at doubling the average tree canopy coverage in Las Vegas to 18 percent by 2035.

"We're having our first tree planting at the City Hall campus, which is a great idea because we're moving the City Hall campus," Mayor Oscar Goodman said dryly. "It's amazing the way the city does business."

Adding to his grief, the tree that was planted is an Arizona ash: "There's something wrong with every aspect of this!" Goodman quipped.

Then he said he was only joking, and he pointed out what proponents say about leafy benefits: increased shade lowers street-level temperatures, trees filter the air, and they make neighborhoods more pleasant and increase property values.

The eight trees highlighted for the program are listed as low to moderate water users.

The other tree-planting events are:

• Oct. 16: 11 a.m. at Ethel Pearson Park, 451 W. Washington Ave.

• Oct. 17: 3:45 p.m. at All American Park, 1551 S. Buffalo Drive.

• Oct. 21: 3:30 p.m. at Mountain Ridge Park, 7151 Oso Blanca Road.

• Oct. 22: 11 a.m. at Doc Romeo Park, 7400 Peak Drive.

• Oct. 23: 10 a.m. at Fire Fighters Memorial Park, 6401 W. Oakey Blvd.

REVIEW-JOURNAL

Lake Mead, photographed last month, provides water to Las Vegas. Still, the city's water supply wasn't enough to keep it from dropping 20 places to rank 47th in a 2008 sustainability report. For the first time, the study included water supply and water quality in determining the ranking of 50 metro areas.
Photo by John Gurzinski

In the past year, the city of Las Vegas has won awards for its alternative vehicle fleet and environmentally conscious building designs.

It has adopted a sustainability policy and backed a new green construction standard.

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The metro area was recognized as having relatively low greenhouse gas emissions.

But a recent survey of the nation's 50 largest metro areas ranked the Las Vegas Valley near the bottom of the pack for sustainability.

In fact, Las Vegas dropped 20 places from where the same survey put it in 2006.

The difference?

Water.

The 2006 survey by SustainLane put Las Vegas in 27th place. The 2008 survey put the area 47th overall.

One of the reasons for the drop in ranking was that water supply and water quality were included as considerations this year, said James Elsen, SustainLane's president and CEO.

"There are challenges based on where a city is," Elsen said. "And we're looking at decreasing snowpacks globally. We're looking at water tables that are dropping every year. We're looking at less rain."

The study does give credit for the work that's been done here, which includes aggressive programs to conserve water and find new water sources.

"It's a ranking of peers, so it is possible that Las Vegas could improve against itself but still drop because they're improving more slowly," Elsen said.

Almost all the desert cities in the survey were affected by the inclusion of water supply data. Albuquerque, N.M., improved one spot overall, but Tucson, Ariz., went down two. Mesa, Ariz., was down three to last place. El Paso, Texas, dropped seven spots, and Phoenix was down 10.

All the desert cities except El Paso were in the bottom 10 in the water supply category.

That category looked at the distance from the primary water source, dependence on snowpack, drought levels, population and per capita water use.

Las Vegas gets almost all of its water from the Colorado River, which is fed by melting snow in the Rocky Mountains and currently is in the worst drought on record.

Officials are aware that the valley needs to diversify water sources and are working on piping in groundwater from the north, said Scott Huntley, spokesman for the Southern Nevada Water Authority.

"We've been making that case," he said. "That is a situation that we are very much trying to address."

Conservation efforts such as lawn replacement also have come a long way.

Southern Nevada used 15 billion fewer gallons of water last year than in 2002, despite adding 400,000 residents and hosting millions of tourists, according to the water authority.

In the mid-1990s, residents used about 350 gallons per person per day; last year, that number was 255 gallons, and it's expected to drop this year.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said he was pleased with local environmental efforts, no matter what the survey said.

"I slept soundly, even having seen these results," he said. "I don't put any weight on these kinds of studies.

"As far as smart water practices, our conservation is about as good as it gets. We're using less water now than we did before, even with the population growth."

Portland, Ore., again topped the rankings, followed by San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago and New York City.

Joining Las Vegas at the bottom of the list were Virginia Beach, Va.; Memphis, Tenn.; Tulsa, Okla.; Oklahoma City, Okla.; and Mesa.

The study uses data from government sources and non-governmental organizations to analyze cities in 16 categories.

It was presented at the Sustainable Cities and Communities Conference in Geneva this month. Japan has adopted the group's methodology to analyze its cities.

Contact reporter Alan Choate at achoate@reviewjournal.com or 702-229-6435.

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Please enter your name Name: Please enter your email Email: Please enter a comment COMMENTS : (word count limit is 300) You have reached the maximum number of words allowed Current Word Count: Note: Comments made by reporters and editors of the Las Vegas Review-Journal are presented with a yellow background. Jim Deacon wrote on November 16, 2008 09:32 PM: This is just one more area to add to the extensive list of quality-of-life indicators that give Las Vegas (and frequently Nevada) rankings near the bottom! The clear message is that public policies focusing on growth lead to unsustainable communities! Public policies focused on sustainability require relatively stable communities. Economies focused on growth will inevitably collapse! Development can be separated from growth, and until we learn how to do it locally, nationally, and worldwide we are doomed to boom and bust cycles. Roger wrote on October 15, 2008 09:28 AM: Th greatest thing that happened to Las Vegas is the housing slump. Growth has been crippled. There needs to be a law limiting the number of people who can move there. Scraping up more desert is an insult to the Earth and an unsustainable lose/lose situation. Water conservation in LasVegas is a joke. How can this morons at SNWA even try to promote that BS. Just the other day, I saw three sprinklers watering a street and causing a big pool in the road. Stupid, stupid community! Perhaps Oscar can water his trees with a bottle of gin... Free Nevada wrote on October 14, 2008 08:25 PM: A lot of people have decided to come here from the North East and because of their background growing up in "the grid", they don't know any better than to try to build sky scrapers and water tunnels (rather than unlock a near-infinite amount of available land in all directions, live in harmony and partner with other Western cities on a desalinization plant and aqueduct like everyone else is doing). We need to start impeaching those who are approving 30-70 story permits in an Earthquake zone, or wanting to suck more water from the tiny little pipes we have stuck in Lake Mead only a few thousand feet from where we blow our sewage. charlie wrote on October 14, 2008 04:24 PM: Although water will become an issue if growth in the valley remains at or near the levels we saw just in the last few years. What these goof ball idiots fail to mention in their reports are the lack of decent medical care in the las vegas valley. Third world medical care is all that's available to the people of las vegas except for those who can afford to leave town for better care. As a matter of fact medical care is so bad in las vegas, border towns down in Mexico offer far better care. Launce Rake wrote on October 14, 2008 03:29 PM: Las Vegas is sustainable - but the growth is not. We need to seriously re-think our public policies that literally encourage sprawl and wasteful use of natural resources. That's not just here, but throughout the Southwest. If we continue stomping on the accelerator of growth, we will one day in the not-so-distant future be hurtling off a cliff. creep wrote on October 14, 2008 03:13 PM: My only question at this time, who is going to bail us out when this area becomes unlivable due to a lack of water? Think property values have fallen now, what will our properties be worth then ? roger wrote on October 14, 2008 03:11 PM: "unrestricted growth", well said Vegas Vic. This article is just another example of how messed up it is out here. There are warning signs all over the place...excessive resale inventories, massive foreclosures, rising unemployment rates, rising vacancy rates in commercial properties, concerns over the water supply,etc..and what do our city and county leaders do? Let the builders keep on building and building and making the problems worse. It is amazing really that LV finds itself on the losing end of almost EVERY study conducted where they compare city to city. Wouldn't surprise me if 50-60%, if not more of the homes here are someday vacant. hilobamacaine wrote on October 14, 2008 12:37 PM: yes we need more trees for the bums to sleep under erik wrote on October 14, 2008 11:04 AM: Oh, Dont tell that to Pat Mulroy at the snwa. She says that the lack of water and unrestrained growth are not tied together. She says we can just steal the water from somewhere else and let them dry up just like we are. William Mulholland could get away with that at the turn of the century. It is hard to believe the same could happen today in backwards Nevada.... Vegas Vic wrote on October 14, 2008 04:33 AM: Of course it's the water. It's a limited resource in the desert and can't support the unrestricted growth this valley has seen over the years. The plan to suck the rural counties dry isn't even a stopgap measure. According to some figures, the water from those counties will only support 200,000 or so homes. That is until the aquifers run dry and then we're back in the same lack of water situation made worse by also adding thousands of more people in the rural counties without water. Las Vegas has a choice...continue with unregulated, unsustainable growth or start limiting growth. One way will extend the supply of limited water. The other way will cause economic disaster throughout the southern part of the state due to lack of any usable water.