Down I-85, contrasting views on Atlanta’s water woes:
A realistic statewide plan, experts say, would tell developers that they cannot build if no water is available, and might have restricted some of the enormous growth in the Atlanta area over the last decade. Already, officials have little notion how to provide for a projected doubling of demand over the next 30 years. The ideas that have been floated, including piping water from Tennessee or desalinating ocean water, will require hundreds of billions of dollars and painful decisions the state has been loathe to undertake.
“It’s been develop first and ask questions later,” said Gil Rogers, a lawyer with the Southern Environmental Law Center.
Instead, the state has engaged in interminable squabbles with its neighbors over dam releases and flow rates. The latest attempt at mediation with Alabama fell apart just last month. And Georgia officials insist that Atlanta would have plenty of water were it not for the Army Corps of Engineers, which they say has released more water from Lake Lanier than is necessary to protect three endangered species downstream. Last week, Governor Perdue filed for an injunction against the Corps.
“We are not here because we consumed our way into this drought, as some would suggest,” said his director of environmental protection, Carol Couch.
If Atlanta runs out of water, they can’t make Coke:
Bruce A. Karas, vice president of sustainability for the Coca-Cola Company, said that no one from the city of Atlanta or its water planning district had approached company officials to ask them to conserve water, though he said Coke has been making efforts to reduce consumption on its own since 2004.
“We’re very concerned,” he said. “Water is our main ingredient. As a company, we look at areas where we expect water abundance and water scarcity, and we know water is scarce in the Southwest. It’s very surprising to us that the Southeast is in a water shortage.”
