Denver Water’s 1.5 million customers must shut off their lawn sprinklers at the start of October as Colorado’s largest water utility grapples with record-setting heat and drought.
The utility’s Board of Water Commissioners on Wednesday voted unanimously to impose the ban, which goes into effect Oct. 1. The new rule adds to drought restrictions in place since spring as Denver Water has attempted to rein in water use.
“We’re facing challenges that we haven’t seen before,” Greg Fisher, Denver Water’s manager of demand planning, told the board.
Denver’s first frost typically falls in the first week of October, so the new rule on watering should not cause much damage to yards as homeowners should already be allowing their yards to go dormant, Fisher said.
Denver Water customers can still water trees, shrubs, vegetables and flowers by hand or using a non-spray irrigation system. Some facilities, like sports fields and public parks, can seek exemptions to the ban on lawn watering.
Prohibiting grass watering after Sept. 30 could save 5,000 acre-feet of water, according to . An acre-foot of water is enough for at least two families’ annual use.
Denver Water’s drought rules follow a winter with little snow and an abnormally hot and dry summer. Low snowpack reduced streamflows into Denver Water’s reservoirs to less than a quarter of normal, and extreme drought continues to fry the mountains from which the utility draws its water.
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The dry, hot summer — the warmest on record for metro Denver — has not offered relief.
Denver Water’s reservoir system is only 73% full at a time when it is normally 94% full, according to the utility. That percentage may drop to only 60% full before next spring’s runoff, according to Denver Water staff.
The utility’s leaders hoped mandatory watering rules and encouraging customers to conserve water would reduce usage by 20% this summer. While customers have cut back, they have not met the utility’s goal.
Its drought restrictions will stay in place until next spring, Fisher said, when leaders will reassess.
“We hope this winter brings relief,” commissioner Gary Reiff said Wednesday during the meeting. “But we need to preserve our resources in case it does not.”
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