[MCN] US city subsidizes rainwater harvest. How's it working out?

[Lance Olsen]

Excerpt: THE CITY OF Tucson, Arizona, officially got serious about rainwater harvesting five years ago, viewing it as a cost-effective tool to reduce demand for potable water.

In 2012, the city’s water utility, Tucson Water, began offering rebates <https://www.tucsonaz.gov/water/rainwater-harvesting-rebate> to its residential customers to subsidize installation of rainwater catchment systems, both to divert water onto landscaping and store it in cisterns.

Later, it expanded the program to include grants and loans to help low-income households harvest rainwater. 

Now it is one year into a three-year study to find out how effective those subsidies have been, and the results look good. Gary Woodard, a consultant with Montgomery & Associates <http://elmontgomery.com/company/staff/gary-woodard/> in Tucson, is leading the study. He says the first year of data gathering confirms that residential rainwater harvesting has reduced the city’s overall potable water demand. 

And it hasn’t merely reduced demand equal to the size of the rainwater harvesting systems, but significantly more.

To learn more about the results so far, Water Deeply recently spoke with Woodard, a longtime Tucson resident who previously served as deputy director of the Water Resources Research Center at the University of Arizona.

https://www.newsdeeply.com/water/community/2018/01/09/in-tucson-subsidies-for-rainwater-harvesting-produce-big-payoff?utm_source=Water+Deeply&utm_campaign=be369dcaa8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_11&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_2947becb78-be369dcaa8-117800933 <https://www.newsdeeply.com/water/community/2018/01/09/in-tucson-subsidies-for-rainwater-harvesting-produce-big-payoff?utm_source=Water+Deeply&utm_campaign=be369dcaa8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_11&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_2947becb78-be369dcaa8-117800933>
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