During a prolonged drought in the early 1990s, L.A.'s Department of Water and Power and Department of Public Works conducted an ambitious experiment. In eight homes, including those of several elected officials, they installed "gray water" equipment that diverted the outflows from washing machines, showers, bathtubs and bathroom sinks to irrigate lawns and gardens outside the homes.
Participants in the program were happy with the results, and the test was officially proclaimed successful in a 21-page research report that found the installations reduced water consumption by about 50% per household on average. No human disease pathogens were found in the outside drainage areas.
Now, the drought is back, the report forgotten, and here we are again, facing another statewide water shortage with river flows at record lows and L.A. residents facing mandatory 15% usage cuts. So what happened to the simple plumbing trick that could save so much water?
What happened was that state health and housing officials, asked in 1992 by the Legislature to draw up a permit code to regulate and legalize gray water use, instead presented a statute so laden with oppressive regulations that few Californians have installed systems. Appendix G of the state plumbing code requires that gray water systems not only get costly permits and have extensive filtering systems but that they also be installed 9 inches underground -- too deep to irrigate most plantings.
In the entire state, only an estimated 200 legal gray water systems have been built. The draconian permitting process has driven gray water, literally as well as figuratively, underground. As many as 1.7 million gray water outlets are running illegally in California, according to Santa Barbara gray water guru Art Ludwig, whose Oasis Design website is a leading resource for gray water research, lore and history.
In official state language, these unofficial gray water systems are "unapproved auxiliary water supplies." But none of the owners has been prosecuted. Northern California even has its "gray water guerrillas," who help homeowners all over the state to construct their own unpermitted systems. "It's a benign conspiracy," says San Diego County gray water expert Steve Bilson.
At the heart of the official obstructiveness is the Sacramento bureaucracies' unproven suspicion that gray waste water carries disease. "They became obsessed with irrelevant risks," Ludwig says. "They miss the big thing -- pollution by industry -- and focus on this."
