Interview with a water engineer on the web-site for teachers and learners of English as a secondary language from a German point of view.
go back to the table of contents
Table of contents		 Interview with
a water engineer		 HOMEback to the homepagePAGE back to the previous page back to
Interview with an environmentalist		 go on to
Wordset: "environment" 		on to the next page

Interview with a water engineer of LA


 
 
DJ/
interviewer		 And now we have a break, folks, to talk with water engineer Jack Johnson of the LA water department. Now then, Jack, why all this protest about our little city taking water from Lake Mono ? Are the birds there really in danger?
Jack Johnson I, for one, don't think so. Of course, the lake is getting smaller and saltier; but I don't think the birds will stay away, no sir.
DJ/
interviewer		 Oh, come on now, Jack. Soon Lake Mono will be too salty for the shrimps in it. Can't Los Angeles get its water from some place else?
Jack Johnson Not a chance. Phoenix and Tucson will need some of the water we're taking from the Colorado River now. And remember this: 17 percent of LA's water today comes from Mono.
DJ/
interviewer		 Good water?
Jack Johnson Excellent water which needs little processing and which is cheap. It flows through tunnels and aqueducts that have already been paid for. Don't forget either that along the way to LA the water races through hydroelectric turbines that produce quite a lot of our electricity.
DJ/
interviewer		 Don't you think we should do all we can to preserve nature and to keep Lake Mono both for birds and ourselves?
Jack Johnson It's not just a question of beauty but also of cost and of the saving of energy. Every 325,000 gallons of water that flow from the lake through our tunnels generate electricity equal to five barrels of oil. What have your naturalists got to say to that, eh? And if we lost water from Mono, it would cost us energy to pump water over the mountains. Do these people think we're made of money? Go on, ask the man in the street what he thinks about paying more for worse water from somewhere else.
DJ/
interviewer		 Last year only about half the usual number of gulls came to Lake Mono.
Jack Johnson Well, I'm sorry but we need that water. We need to save that energy. And when is all said and done � people are more important than birds.
go back to the table of contents
Table of contents		 Interview with
a water engineer		 HOMEback to the homepagePAGE back to the previous page back to
Interview with an environmentalist		 go on to
Wordset: "environment" 		on to the next page