Water Works 27 - 5/13/03

The Indictment

Walnut Creek is reason enough for dragging you around the way I have in the past few episodes, on our virtual tour of Quakertown and the upper Hunterdon Plateau. You should know it was only recently that I first grasped the sizeable distortion of reality involved in the NJDEP’s use of Walnut Creek to estimate our aquifer’s water production capacity. I always thought an entirely different stream ran through Barton Hollow. It was only after someone showed me my mistake that I understood what the testimony in Water Works 9 really meant: the NJDEP dramatically overstated the water-bearing properties of our Lockatong shale aquifer by inserting Walnut Creek into its calculations.

To grasp the full extent of what the state has done here, you need to get behind the figures the way we did with Walnut Creek. Our fundamental problem is that the high volume water extractions concentrated in the 5 square miles of the upper Lockatong watershed should properly be spread across 25 to 50 square miles of land, to adequately replenish a Lockatong shale aquifer like ours. Our tour nearly circumscribed those 5 square miles of Franklin Township and should enable you, with nothing more than an internet road map, to understand the shape of our local terrain and its most outstanding characteristic – everything that surrounds us is below us.

Since water will not flow uphill, to the Hunterdon Plateau’s highest ridge in this instance, any land beyond the first mile and a half of the 15-mile Lockatong watershed is irrelevant to the replenishment of our local aquifer. The water-bearing rock of the upper Lockatong cannot adequately recharge, because the amount of water pumped from it nearly equals the aquifer’s natural recharge rate and far exceeds the NJDEP’s maximum safe limit for extractions.

Along with the NJDEP’s new plans to make matters even worse, that is what all the shouting has been about. You can find the same argument, in the language of millions of gallons and acre-inches, in Water Works 2. You will also be reminded there that our Lockatong bedrock is commonly regarded as one of the stingiest aquifer rock formations in New Jersey. You will not find that noted in any of the NJDEP’s recent public hearing pronouncements, in its paper trail chronicle of water mining here, or in the aquifer study it conducted to justify its recent proposal for additional water extractions.

Water mining in the upper Lockatong watershed has chronically lowered water levels near Quakertown, making the failure of shallower wells inevitable. Newer and deeper wells like the one my neighbor drilled in Water Works 23, when my own artesian well stopped overflowing, have repeatedly demonstrated critical natural limitations of our local water supply system. Both conditions were compounded by the extended drought that all of New Jersey recently suffered, the only cause the NJDEP has ever suggested for the failure of any Quakertown wells. Beyond that, as Water Works 3 explained, the NJDEP’s progressive depletion of our aquifer has also removed any margin of safety Franklin Township’s zoning provides for our drinking water, even without a drought.

The NJDEP condoned and abetted violations of state regulations and either ignored or never collected a decade’s worth of local water usage records, as Water Works 13 told you. In the middle of a near record drought it endorsed previously illegal irrigation connections between high-capacity wells here and increased the amount of water pumped from those wells by 60%, without any investigation of the impacts on our aquifer. Together, Hearing Officer Miri’s calendar tricks and the story of Walnut Creek mean the NJDEP has now misled the public about matters of considerable significance twice, concerning its most recent proposal to increase water allocations here. All of which comprise what is usually called, in the evaluation of the conduct of public officials no less than in scientific observations, a pattern warranting investigation.

That wraps up the summary I promised you last week. Muller’s spring, Trout’s pond and Wilfredo will all return, in case you were wondering about them, when we resume our in-depth explorations of the Hunterdon Plateau’s bedrock and the mind of the NJDEP. But that will have to wait until Water Works returns from a short break, when our story will continue.

Note – the Water Works episodes referenced above are: 2 (3/7), 3 (3/10), 13 (3/24), 22 (4/7), 23 (4/14), 24 (4/21), 25 (4/28), and 26 (5/5), from my contributions. Water Works 9 (3/17) is an excerpt from public comments to the NJDEP by Fellow Correspondent on the NJDEP’s plans to increase water allocations in Franklin Township. The other extracts from Fellow Correspondent’s comments are at Water Works 6-12 (3/13-3/20) and 14-21 (3/25-4/3).

Ron Gutkowski