El Ni o makes many nervous since drought greatly affects the aquifer which depends on rainfall to refill itself. During drought years, little water is returned to the aquifer. West Maui receives its water supply from surface sources in the West Maui Mountain Watershed. Drought affects their supplies, but their main concern is usually bacterial contamination of their water since it is an older system. A sufficient rainy season from November through March usually restores levels of water in all three areas, but with the increase in population and tourism, Maui can quickly enter a crisis state when there is a loss of rainfall.
Hotels are large consumers of water.
One hotel can use as much as a half of million gallons of water a day. For example, the Grand Wailea Hotel was able to conserve 27,000 gallons of water daily by limiting its washing of guests ' towels and sheets. Especially with El Ni o coming, Hawaii is in need of conservation methods to preserve this precious common resource. Home Page Psy 412 Miami University . This document has been accessed 306 times since July 15, 1997.