Water Works 49 - 4/23/04

We Celebrate “Earth Day”

In our last episode I left you wondering why the NJDEP had not rolled back the extraordinary amount of water now pumped from Quakertown’s aquifer, when all the research ever done here says it should have – including the NJDEP’s. Unfortunately, when I got you wondering about that we were still sitting on an environmental time-bomb left over from the previous episode. I apologize for having talked you into a pair of unresolved cliff-hangers that way, but right now you’ll just have to make yourself as comfortable as possible up there until I have time to attend to you. I have an important announcement to make.

Despite my best efforts to deliver nothing less than 100% defect-free calamity howling here at Water Works, I must confess that I have made a humiliating mistake. It first surfaced while I was dragging poor Fellow Correspondent up and down every creek between Quakertown and the D&R Canal. (43-46) Back then, when we looked at what the U.S. Geologic Survey had to say about water flows in Lockatong Creek, we discovered the Lockatong watershed drains less than half as much land as we thought – about 23 square miles instead of 54. (i)

That difference could have caused me some trouble. For instance, I’ve told you that several times more water flows through neighboring creeks in dry spells than through the Lockatong, though the other creeks drain far less land. (45) I’m sure you will be relieved to know those alarming figures were based on a properly sized watershed. And the recharge rate for Quakertown’s aquifer, calculated from Lockatong baseflows (46) with the right size drainage basin, is still extremely low, but up somewhat from “miniscule.” Actually, the only impact the wrong number had was to make damage inflicted on the Lockatong watershed look only half as bad as it should have looked in one episode. (28)

What’s so embarrassing about that? My source for the wrong sized watershed was the NJDEP – evidence it presented at the public hearing it held here a year ago, when it last proposed to increase water mining near Quakertown. (ii) Exactly how the NJDEP used that 54-square mile watershed should embarrass us all.

Since the state never measured the impact of all the water pumping it had approved here, it was forced to show that the Lockatong watershed’s total recharge was much larger than anyone had ever suggested. (2, 47) Instead of using the Lockatong watershed recharge rate that it once determined here with us (48, 2), the NJDEP based its calculations on stream flows from a very dissimilar Walnut Creek. (26) That increased the rate by a factor of 2.6. Multiplying that inflated rate by 54 square miles, instead of 23, made the Lockatong watershed seem 6 times more productive than it really is. So there is no misunderstanding about any of this – I will defend the claims I am making in any public forum the NJDEP chooses.

This is no mere clerical error. The state took 4 years to prepare its case. The NJDEP misrepresented critical evidence supporting a proposal it made at its own public hearing. Standards of professional conduct at its Geologic Survey and its Bureau of Water Allocation apparently differ from ours. Call us old-fashioned, but here in Franklin we call that deception. The NJDEP knew it could not justify more than a fraction of the water pumping it had endorsed here. Given the chance to finally admit the truth, concerning a matter of public health and safety, it chose to waste the public’s time and money on a dishonest farce.

The state’s best shot missed by more than half. If the NJDEP had used the right size watershed and the Lockatong recharge rate it once ratified here in Franklin, the result would have shown it should never have allowed more than one-fifth of all the water pumping it permitted near Quakertown. Rather than roll back the pumping, the NJDEP tried to increase it, which forced the state to defend what it had already done. It couldn’t. It lied to us instead.

Yesterday Governor McGreevey and Commissioner Campbell held their usual round of “Earth Day” festivities. If precedent is any guide, the day’s events included the designation of Lockatong Creek to join Capoolong Creek as a strictly-protected C-1 stream. Today their NJDEP is still killing wetlands at the headwaters of both creeks, and the water quality time-bomb their people know we’re sitting on is still ticking. But I can at least fetch you down from that other cliff where I left you hanging lately: that question of why they allow the destruction to continue. The answer should be obvious by now – they must want to, that’s why. Happy Earth Day to you too, gentlemen.

Ron Gutkowski