Getting to Green

You really should be reading the blog posts under the pseudonym "G. Rendell" that constitute the Getting to Green blog at Inside Higher Ed. G. Rendell, it is explained, is an administrator at a large private school in the midwest who is heading up Rendell's campus' effort to meet the American College and University President's Climate Commitment (ACUPCC). The tidbits of lessons learned—about water, energy, people, laws— are interesting and written very lightly. In the latest post, titled Water or Not, Rendell muses about his discovery that the water laws in some states may outlaw the capture and reuse of rainwater:

Think about it—a campus takes the rainwater which falls on building roofs, stores it, for a bit, then runs it out onto (or into) the ground. If the cistern weren't there, the rainwater would flow off the roof onto the ground (similar ground, not very far away) anyway. Where there's no measurable effect, there's no harm. Where there's no harm, there's no foul (remember, it's athletic fields we're talking about, here). What's the problem?