It took years of careful persistence from Moab-based experts and residents, but Utah’s Water Quality Board is now changing state rules on graywater. Soon property owners could see more options – and less cost – when it comes to re-using their shower and laundry water for outside landscaping. Molly Marcello from KZMU community radio in Moab tells us more.
It’s a bright November morning when staff and board members from Utah’s water and environmental quality departments begin gathering in a Moab garden. It’s a small space, about 200 square feet, but full of fruit trees and native plants.
"I brought a shovel around if anyone wants to check out how beautifully rich the soil is, they can feel free to do so..." said Dr. Roslynn Brain-McCann, sustainability professor at Utah State-University in Moab.
In an arid climate, the rich soil of her front yard garden is notable. But it’s not her garden’s soil that’s brought state regulators to her front yard, it’s how she waters it – with a shower and a load of laundry.
"This system is entirely graywater fed and it's been a fun experiment to see what's working, what to shift, what to tweak," Brian-McCann said.
Back in 2016, at the urging of Brain-McCann and others in Moab, state regulators issued her front yard an experimental permit for a simple, gravity-fed graywater system. Utah health and wastewater experts have now studied her garden for four years as they consider changes to the state’s graywater code.
"When the policy doesn't make sense to me, it's not the end of the road to me. It's like, let's change the policy, let’s make this happen, and make it right," she said.
Utah’s longstanding rule on graywater, is a far leap from the simple system developed in Moab. That rule requires a 250-gallon holding tank, a pumping system, and filter. Health officials say not one Utah property owner has ever taken advantage of it.
In comparison, the simple graywater design uses gravity to lead shower and laundry water to mulch basins that nourish plants under the surface. It requires little more than a $50 valve at the time of home construction. That valve can easily be turned to direct graywater to the garden or to the wastewater treatment plant.
"Right now we're in November and it's been at least – at least – and this is a very conservative estimate, two months since we've had any precip here in Moab," Brian McCann said. "So to have a system where our water that would normally go to a wastewater treatment plant is actually providing the water needs of my landscape, it’s to me a no brainer when it comes to climate change."
Climate change concerns in the desert combined with creative problem-solving drove Moab’s demand for a more functional state graywater rule. This according to Southeast Utah Environmental Health Director Orion Rogers.
"I think it's just due to the extensive growth that we're seeing as well as the influx of new thought processes and an overall interest in these sort of systems as well as the environment that we live in essentially demanding water conservation," Rogers said.
But even as the state makes big moves to legalize this system, local health departments and districts would not be required to opt-in. Rogers, however, feels confident that Moab can be the example for the rest of the state.
"As we start showing how this works in Moab, I think that other health departments are going to come on board. And as we have developments come along that are using graywater, we can show the world that this works," he said.
The new graywater rule is out now for public comment. In a few months, if the water quality board finds no significant changes to be made, these simple graywater systems will officially become legal in Utah.
"There are a lot of potential graywater systems ready to be turned on as a result of this rule," said Moab City Mayor Emily Niehaus who is also on the Utah Water Quality Board. She says having a better way to reuse water is not just beneficial for Moab’s arid desert, but also for the entire state.
"A state where desertification and lack of water, and huge expected growth - we have to be taking these measures. And so while it’s important for us in Moab to change the law to help us do what we want to do locally, it’s also very exciting to know that other people in other counties, in other parts of Utah are going to benefit from this too," Niehaus said.
