Friday, November 3, 2000
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Friday, November 3, 2000 |
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Drought conditions worsen Drought conditions in Coweta County have gotten worse due to the continued lack of any measurable precipitation, and more severe water use restrictions may be needed to be instituted to cope with the situation, officials say. Coweta County water Superintendent Harry Hughes notes that the Palmer Index, one of the major indicators of drought conditions, has changed Coweta County's status from "moderate" to "severe." The U.S. Drought Index continues to place Coweta County in the "severe/extreme" drought categories. "The latest Palmer Index indicates that this area of the state was 3.22 inches behind in rainfall as of October 21. That's almost one-half inch more than just one week earlier," said Hughes. "The Palmer Index now indicates that our county needs almost eight inches of rain to make up for the drought situation," he added. "Since drought conditions are getting worse, we may need to go to the next level of restrictions and implement a total ban on outdoor water use," said Hughes. "Of course, any change to our current restrictions will be up to the Newnan Water, Sewerage and Light Commission because we purchase the water for our system from them. As we have in the past, we will institute any changes approved by the... commission in order to make sure water supplies remain adequate for all of our customers." Hughes noted that "Coweta County residents have had an excellent response to the current restrictions, cutting their usage dramatically from May to October." In May customers of the Coweta County Water System were using 225 million gallons per month; in October that usage had dropped some 39 percent to 139 million gallons per month, he said. Coweta County is continuing to work with other entities to increase water supplies, Hughes said, and has agreed with Atlanta to acquire approximately three million gallons per day by early summer 2001 with 10-15 million gallons per day by 2005. There is already an agreement with the city of Griffin to provide 5-10 million gallons per day by 2004 and B.T. Brown Reservoir is scheduled to go on-line in 2003, providing approximately eight million gallons per day, he said. "Newnan Utilities and Coweta County have planned well as far as water supplies for our customers are concerned. You just can't plan for a drought of this magnitude," said Hughes. "This is among the worst droughts we have seen in Coweta County."
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