According to the most recent U.S. Drought Monitor Map, published Thursday, there is no drought on the East End. Nevertheless, the Suffolk County Water Authority issued a Stage 1 water alert this week due to "dangerously low levels in water storage tanks."
If things don't change, water pressure could be impacted, limiting an emergency response to, say, a wildfire along the Napeague stretch.
The fact that the alert was issued in a non-drought year shows the strong effect pumping for irrigation is having on water supplies.
"Demand continues to increase, which is a concern," Jeffrey Szabo, the water authority's chief operating officer, said in a phone call.
The last time the water authority issued an alert was in the summer of 2022, when the region was in extreme drought. Before that, an alert hadn't been issued since 2016, during another uncommonly dry summer.
"If demand continues at this rate, customers in your area may experience reduced water pressure at their homes or businesses," the alert read. "Most importantly, low tank levels threaten S.C.W.A.'s ability to maintain adequate pressure and reserve supply in the event of a fire emergency."
The July 16 fire on Napeague forced firefighters to extend hoses over a quarter of a mile through the brush. There were no nearby hydrants, and their brush trucks couldn't traverse a slash pile of pitch pines felled by the southern pine beetle.
If there was good news about the fire, it was that firefighters didn't experience any water pressure issues, said Chris Beckert, the Amagansett Fire Department chief.
Montauk is one of Mr. Szabo's top areas of concern, and number one on the South Fork. On the North Fork, Southold Town is having real trouble keeping up with demand. Mr. Szabo spoke at a public hearing there recently in favor of a law the town passed that places restrictions on watering lawns.
East Hampton Town Councilwoman Cate Rogers, who recently served on a ChangeHampton panel discussing sustainability in landscaping, said if fears of impact to emergency responders continue, she would be open to looking at a similar law.
"We had a brush fire and we were lucky. But luck doesn't hold out forever. Nothing is more important than water for essential services. These practices that needlessly deplete water need a hard look," she said, adding that she disconnected her irrigation system a decade ago after hearing Edwina von Gal, founder of the Perfect Earth Project, give a talk.
She would be interested in incentivizing good behavior. For example, not just penalizing for over-clearing, but somehow encouraging under-clearing.
"It's common sense to save water," she said. "It's important across every aspect of our community. Runoff from irrigation also ends up in ponds and bays and is connected to algal blooms. Watering a lawn is a practice that only benefits blades of grass and nothing else."
"In summer we have all our wells working because of irrigation in the early morning. Our entire system is maxed out, pumping over 500,000 gallons a minute. It's a tremendous amount of water," said Mr. Szabo. "People want their grass as green as possible."
For context, Dan Dubois, the water authority's director of communications, said that January 2024, when irrigation systems are offline, the water authority pumped 338,963 gallons per day in Montauk.
In July 2024, that number ballooned to 2,516,653 gallons per day.
In the winter months, the overall system peaks between 100,000 and 110,000 gallons per minute, only 20 percent the amount pumped in the summer.
"We're looking at well fields in Montauk that continuously struggle to meet demand," said Mr. Szabo. "Conservation and education are important, but we need to do something else to meet existing demand."
He said the aquifer on the East End doesn't contain the same amount of water as there is in UpIsland townships like Babylon and Islip.
"The overwhelming majority of the pumping is for irrigation. We don't want to get to the point where we begin to lose critical infrastructure. From our perspective, we're the supplier of water. We have plenty in the aquifer, but that doesn't mean we should be wasteful. We need to value our water. People still do things like wash down their driveway with a hose. Habits need to change. Let's not water cement."
The water authority is urging its customers to eliminate all unnecessary water use. Limit lawn watering. If absolutely necessary, follow an odd/even watering schedule. If your house has an odd number address, water on odd-numbered days; if even, water on even-numbered days. Never water between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., as a lot of water will be lost to evaporation.
The South Fork is home to some of the heaviest water users in the county. A Meadow Lane residence in Southampton was pumping over 16 million gallons annually in of 2022. A property on Two Mile Hollow Road in East Hampton uses over 4 million gallons annually.
The water authority says its average Suffolk County customer uses about 130,000 gallons per year.
