environment

You weekend warriors are in good company if – now that spring finally has sprung - you find yourself grabbing a basket full of food, soft blanket and Frisbee to head to your local park. April 23, is National Picnic Day, after all. In the Baltimore region, Carroll County is – and has been - the spot for some quality picnicking. The county planned it that way back in the late 1980s. The 1987 Carroll County Parks and Land Preservation Plan, which we found in the Regional Information Center, shows that 45 percent of survey respondents reported picnicking an average of 4.5 times a year. As a result, the plan also predicted that interest in picnicking would hold steady throughout the 1990s and into the Millennium. Carroll County’s parks and recreation areas, with 810 existing facilities, had more than enough space to accommodate the needs of the pastorally-inclined, according to the plan. Park-goers could enjoy most of that space without intrusion by other parties, too. By 1995, the plan anticipated that only 535 of its facilities would be occupied by multiple parties at a time. However, picnics hardly were the only outdoor activities that drew people to Carroll County’s facilities. Off-road vehicles - such as ATVs, dirt bikes, and modified trucks and jeeps - were on the rise in popularity, as well as organized sports. In short, they needed acres of more space. By 1987, Carroll County had limited space for off-roading, and according to their models, it would need 70.5 miles of track by 1995. Plus, the county anticipated that it should construct 46 more baseball fields, 4.5 acres of swimming pools, and 67 more basketball courts. Carroll County’s facilities currently boast more than 30 parks, and thousands of acres of open land, many of which have been added since the 1987 plan. These facilities include picnic areas, trails, hunting and fishing space, playgrounds, tennis and basketball courts, and baseball, softball and multipurpose fields.

Source: Greenhorne and O’Mara, Inc. 1987. Carroll County Parks and Land Preservation Plan, 1986-1987.

Since the 1970s and 1980s, Public Service Announcements have taught good GenXers and Millennial children about water conservation. These 60-second segments stressed that we, too, could save the planet if we kept our showers short, turned off the faucet when brushing our teeth, and washed the dinner dishes by hand. It turns out that while limiting personal consumption is beneficial, it pales in comparison to steam-generated thermoelectric power, which consumes many millions more gallons of water per day. So while April showers pour down all around us, we looked at the Brookings Institute’s February 2018 report “Exploring national and local water use patterns in the U.S.” to see how our region consumes its H2O.The Baltimore region used 1,091 million gallons of water per day (Mgal/d) in 2010, according to the Brookings Institute. The majority of that usage, 55.5 percent, went toward thermoelectric power at plants - such as the Wheelabrator Baltimore in the Westport neighborhood of Baltimore City and Herbert A. Wagner generating station in northern Anne Arundel County - while public water supply was responsible for 25.2 percent. Industrial usage accounted for 13.9 percent of the region’s water usage; 8.8 percent went to things such as livestock, mining, aquaculture and self-supplied residences; and very little, 1.3 percent, was used for irrigation. This ranked Baltimore’s usage 40th out of 100 U.S. metropolitan regions in 2010.By comparison, the U.S. as a whole used 355 billion gallons of water per day (Bgal/d) in 2010, according to Brookings. Approximately 45.3 percent of that usage went to thermoelectric power, while 32.3 percent went to irrigation, 11.8 percent to public supply, and 4.5 percent to industrial. That’s a tidal wave of water flowing to keep our electricity on and crops growing! But between 2010 and 2015, residential water use in the Baltimore region dropped by 22 million gallons per day, while population increased by nearly 87,000. So how do we explain population growth and water consumption decline? One explanation may be that our household appliances simply are becoming more efficient – from our washing machines to dishwashers - and consuming less water. Sources: Brookings Institute’s February 2018 report “Exploring national and local water use patterns in the U.S."Brookings, “Less water, more risk: Exploring national and local water use patterns in the US,” 2017.Brookings, “US households are using less water, but what does that mean for metros and infrastructure?,” 2017.