On Wednesday, Gov. Gary Herbert signed an executive order for state facilities, including Utah State University, to take steps in conserving water.
Under Herbert’s order, state facilities are not supposed to water their lawns during the heat of the day, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
USU facilities associate vice president, Charles Darnell said the department has already switched the timer to comply with this regulation.
However, he wants to make sure this applies to the university’s situation. On most of campus, rather than using culinary water for landscape, the department uses what comes from a canal, and a separate company dictates how much the university will get at a certain time.
“So now we have kind of a dual restriction,” Darnell said. “And we’re trying to evaluate how that’s going to affect us and create some contingency plans so that we can maintain campus at the same time with these restrictions in place.”
Other than that, Darnell said the university already complies with much of the executive order. One part of it involves low-flow systems, which a lot of buildings already have because of the federal Energy Policy Act of 1992.
Another provision Darnell said the university has already been working on involves an update in irrigation technology. He said last year, facilities started putting in a system that takes rainfall into account when watering the property. He said this covers about 50 percent of campus.
Rob Reeder, director of landscape management and operations, said it has reduced water consumption by about 20 percent.
Herbert’s executive order also mandates metering water so state facilities know how much they are using.
Mac Mckee, director of the Utah Water Research Laboratory, said this helps in water management whether there’s a drought or not. He said, for example, he has spoken to past presidents of the Sevier Water Users Association, which uses a monitoring system that gives a lot of real-time detail about water flows.
“They consistently say that they have something on the order of 15 percent more water available to the irrigators without having any more water in the system,” McKee said.
Darnell said although the metering system for canal water needs to be updated, the rest of campus already has a comprehensive one, which is detailed enough to tell that there are leaks.