PORT TOWNSEND — Although recent rainfall has decreased the risk of a severe water shortage in Port Townsend, the city remains at the mercy of the weather in regard to possible tightening of conservation measures.
“It’s hard to determine,” City Manager David Timmons said Wednesday of the water supply.
“The historical trends include heavy rains from October to December.
“If that happens, we should be fine.”
In August during a severe drought on the North Olympic Peninsula, the City Council approved implementation of Stage 1 of a three-stage water conservation plan.
The aim of Stage 1 was to reach targets of a 10 percent reduction in water use within the city and a 15 percent cutback in consumption for the Port Townsend Paper mill, East Jefferson County’s largest private employer.
Those targets have been reached, Ken Clow, city public works director, told the council Monday.
The city has cut its consumption to about 900,000 gallons per day, and the mill often uses less than 10 million gallons per day, he said.
The water level in the Lords Lake Reservoir has fallen from a high of 570 million gallons in July to about 250 million gallons in October, he added.
The amount now in the reservoir would last both the mill and city customers about 20 days if it were the only water source, Timmons said.
The 70 million-gallon trigger to activate Stage 2, which would shut down the mill until water levels rose, doesn’t seem to be a current possibility, he added.
The reservoir is getting 12 million gallons a day from the Little Quilcene and Big Quilcene rivers. That amount is used daily between city water customers and the mill.
One way to alleviate concerns would be to take in 14 million to 18 million gallons a day and keep current usage levels, Timmons said.
“We need to be putting more into the river than we are taking out,” he said.
The ability to do so, Timmons said, depends on when the rainy season begins.
Recent heavy rains in Port Townsend don’t necessarily ease the shortage.
“It’s raining in the mountains, which is a good thing,” Timmons said.
“We don’t want it to rain in Port Townsend; we want it to rain in Quilcene.”
Timmons said the city could increase the storage capacity of Lords Lake by placing several 2-foot-by-6-foot boards in the overflow, but this can’t be done in the rainy season since it would lead to high water levels that would go over the top of the temporary dam.
Timmons attributes the decreased water use to the end of the tourist season.
Conservation measures have helped, he emphasized, but the main reason for the lower levels is there are now fewer people in town because tourism has eased off.
“This is hard to predict,” Timmons said.
“Our ability to get through this depends on when the rains start.”
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
