Emphasizing the effect of New Jersey’s drought on groundwater levels, and reporting that a federal reservoir has been tapped to aid the Delaware River’s flow in Trenton, an interstate agency that manages water resources and maintains the Delaware River has announced a special public hearing for November 19 at 1:30 p.m. During the hearing the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) will accept public input on the persistent dry conditions and on ways to address them. Residents of Hopewell Township —one of eight municipalities in Mercer County located within the River Basin — can attend the hearing virtually to voice their opinions, as the commission weighs a decision to declare a “water supply emergency” if things worsen.
AT STAKE ARE STREAMFLOWS, GROUNDWATER, AND RESERVOIR STORAGE
“Many areas in the Delaware River Basin continue to experience significantly below-normal precipitation with resulting effects on streamflows, groundwater levels and reservoir storage,” said DRBC Executive Director Steve Tambini. “These conditions have already prompted the states of New Jersey, New York, Delaware and Pennsylvania to declare drought watches or warnings in most or all of the counties that lie within the Basin.”
TRENTON FLOW OBJECTIVE
Beginning in October, low flows in the Delaware River prompted the DRBC to conduct direct releases of stored water from a federal reservoir, Beltzville (Carbon Co., Pa.) to meet the minimum flow objective for the river at Trenton. As of November 6, “approximately 1.12 billion gallons of water have been released from Beltzville Reservoir to meet the Trenton Flow Objective,” said Amy Shallcross, DRBC’s Water Resource Operations Manager. An additional source of water in the lower basin that is available for use to meet the Trenton Flow Objective is Blue Marsh Reservoir (Berks Co., Pa.).
The purpose of the Trenton Flow Objective is to control the “salt front” in the tidal Delaware River. Freshwater is needed to keep salty or brackish water from advancing up the Delaware Bay during low-flow conditions and reaching drinking water intakes for Philadelphia and New Jersey, and industrial intakes along the river.
“The salt front is currently 17 river miles upstream from its normal location for this time of year despite the reservoir releases,” said Shallcross. “If more water is needed to address salt front management, we expect continued decreases in reservoir storage and additional drought risks.”
DROUGHT MANAGEMENT ACTIONS
Unless precipitation trends change in the near term, initial drought management actions are reductions in flow objectives for the main stem Delaware River and out-of-basin diversions to conserve reservoir storage. In a drought emergency, the drought plan gives the DRBC the authority to call for releases from additional reservoirs to increase river flow.
The Basinwide drought management plan is based on the amount of combined storage in the three New York City (NYC) reservoirs, the largest in the Delaware River Basin. As of last week, the combined storage in NYC’s Delaware River Basin reservoirs was 38 billion gallons above the level that initiates a drought watch. The low storage is in part due to NYC’s Delaware Aqueduct Repair Project. NYC is not currently diverting water from the Delaware River Basin reservoirs while the repair is being made. The public is encouraged to visit the NYC Department of Environmental Protection website for updates on the Delaware Aqueduct repair project: https://www.nyc.gov/site/dep/whats-new/delaware-aqueduct-shutdown-impact-upstate.page.
The DRBC is also urging all water users to voluntarily curb water use in Basin communities where drought watches and warnings have been issued, maximize water efficiency and cooperate with all state-issued alerts. “Over 14 million people rely on our shared waters, and while we may believe this resource is limitless the fact is that we never know when the next long-term drought might begin. Collectively we can work toward improving water efficiency every day, not only when we experience dry conditions,” added Tambini.
The DRBC is a federal-interstate government agency responsible for managing the water resources within the 13,539 square-mile Delaware River Basin without regard to political boundaries. The five Commission members are the governors of the Basin states (Delaware, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania) and the commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ North Atlantic Division, who represents the federal government.
To register for the November 19 virtual public hearing, and for more information about the Commission’s drought operating plans, links to Basin state drought pages, updates about water resource conditions, and water savings tips, please visit the DRBC’s website www.drbc.gov.
