Making Do With Less Water : Resources: Faced with rationing, many firms are cutting back. Some heavy users--such as hospitals and car washes--say they’ve gone as far as they can.

The water tower at Paramount Pictures is a familiar Hollywood landmark and, as the state scuffs through its fifth year of drought, might be a handy corporate asset with water rationing in the air.

If it held any water, that is.

Like so many things in Tinseltown, the 61-year-old tower is merely a high-profile prop these days. Built as a backup fire-fighting system, the tower was drained two years ago for earthquake safety reasons but was retained for its nostalgic and historic value.

“There’s no water in it. We wish there was, sometimes,” quipped David Mannix, senior vice president of operations for the Paramount Pictures studio group.

Without the aid of water from above, Paramount is taking water conservation very seriously, Mannix said. Studio plumbers are constantly adjusting sprinkler heads, the landscaping staff is using air conditioner condensation to water some plants, overall landscape watering has been trimmed in half, and, as part of a continuing renovation, the company is going beyond code requirements by installing some ultra-low-flush toilets--”the ones that sound like a vacuum cleaner.”

Some of the biggest users of water in Southern California are commercial and industrial operations. So when the forecast is for continuing sunshine and probable water rationing, it’s time for businesses to start worrying.

Of course, virtually every business uses some water. But many companies, from car washes to diaper services to restaurants to semiconductor manufacturers, must have water to do what they do. Some water-intensive companies say they have squeezed out all the excess usage and are worried that if they must reduce more it will mean inefficient production, higher prices for consumers and perhaps even layoffs.

Already, 20 municipalities have some sort of mandatory water controls, and the Los Angeles City Council is considering a water rationing plan that would carry fines of up to 75% of the bill plus a $4 fee per excess billing unit (748 gallons).

The Los Angeles plan, approved last week by the Department of Water and Power’s board of commissioners, would require households and businesses to reduce water use by 10% from 1986 levels beginning March 1 and by 15% beginning May 1.

This comes after months of voluntary reductions of 10% from 1986 levels. About half of residents and businesses met the goal last summer, said Jerry Gewe, a DWP senior engineer responsible for water resources planning. By fall, voluntary compliance had fallen to about 40% for residents, while businesses maintained their 50% pace, he said.

For those unable to meet their water quotas--both households and businesses--an appeals process is being set up, Gewe said. DWP officials understand that some businesses have grown since 1986 or didn’t exist in ‘86, he said.

“There will be some disagreements, but by and large most of the businesses recognize that they are part of the community and they have to do their part,” Gewe said.

“We have the ability, in light of employment, to make adjustments. If it’s going to cost people their jobs, and they’re doing everything you would expect from reasonably prudent people, we probably would grant an exemption,” he said. “We don’t want to put people out of business.”

Gewe added that “there’s a big exemption for health and safety” that would apply to places such as hospitals, which require lots of water to clean and disinfect people, equipment and facilities.

What the drought will do to the economy is the subject of debate. Agriculture alone could lose up to $2 billion in crop value, which may translate into higher food prices.

A study commissioned by the DWP last year determined that an extended statewide water shortage that cut supplies by 24% could cost Los Angeles industry as much as $25 billion and 350,000 jobs. But that study included assumptions that don’t apply to 1991’s local economy, so the consultant is preparing a new report that will show a much less bruising hit.

Noted agricultural economist Henry Vaux said: “Our water system, particularly in Southern California is extraordinarily resilient.”

“There are going to be some hardships, and there won’t be business as usual. Some people will be hit pretty hard, but life is going to go on. There won’t be an apocalypse,” said Vaux, director of the UC Water Resources Center in Riverside.

Businesses are trying a variety of things to save water, ranging from the whimsical--a Carmel mall has posted bathroom signs that read, “In the land of sun and fun we never flush for No. 1”--to the more practical--Paramount has started requiring janitors to make a nightly “water report” on leaks so they can be fixed immediately.

Delta Airlines, like many other carriers, recently started washing its airplanes more frequently because clean planes have less wind drag and therefore use less jet fuel, which has soared in price since Iraq invaded Kuwait in August. But not in Los Angeles, a major Delta hub with 105 flights a day.

“Normally, to just have that sparkle on the planes, you would wash them when they overnight,” said Frances Conner, spokeswoman for Atlanta-based Delta. “But now we’re doing it in Texas or Georgia or other states where water is more plentiful.”

United Airlines also has resorted to out-of-state plane washing and has reduced the flush volume on airplane toilets, a spokesman said.

But officials at many water-sensitive companies are wondering what more they can do. They fear that if the drought continues, even more dramatic cuts will be required.

“I can’t imagine that we could use any less water than we do now,” said Tracy Whitlock, marketing director of Pasadena-based Dy-Dee Diaper Service.

The diaper service uses about 4.5 gallons per child per day to wash its product. That is much less than is consumed when diapers are laundered at home or if disposable diapers are used correctly, with waste products being flushed out of the diaper before it is discarded, Whitlock said. Dy-Dee’s business has grown sharply in the past few years as some parents have abandoned disposable diapers for cloth.

“It’s ironic that we could be charged penalties because our business is growing because people are switching from the higher water use and less environmentally safe products,” Whitlock said.

The Hunt-Wesson tomato cannery in Fullerton reduced its water use by 27% over two years because of a new recycling system. But the plant still gulped 409 million gallons last year, making it one of the largest water users in Orange County.

A company spokeswoman said further cutbacks would hurt production.

Some industries that are conspicuous water users are also the most jealous of their water allotments and are recycling water where they can. Many golf courses, for example, are switching to urban runoff or other reclaimed water to keep some of the grass alive.

Carwashes are easy targets but contend that they are efficient reusers of water. In fact, some water agencies are urging residential customers to wash their cars at professional carwashes because those operations use a fraction of the fresh water consumed by a home wash, said Sam Olivito, executive director of the California Carwash Assn., which represents 1,500 carwashes in the state.

“Everybody sees a carwash and that there’s water in the carwash and the thought is, ‘There has to be waste,’ ” Olivito said. “The most vital, important thing they have in this business is water. If they don’t have that, they don’t have anything.”

Armando Figueroa figures that he uses only 24 gallons of fresh water to wash each car at Carson Carwash, which he co-owns. The remaining 75 gallons or so is all recycled water.

“We have been water savers all along,” Figueroa said. Carson Carwash uses about 9 million gallons of water a year.

Huge Cedars-Sinai Medical Center has received conservation awards for installing low-flow shower heads and toilet flush restricters, among other things, said Conn Flatley, vice president for support services.

“The problem is the hospital, by its nature, is very water intensive,” Flatley said. At least 10,000 patients, doctors and employees pass through the medical center each day, “and they’re brushing their teeth and taking showers and going to the bathroom and washing their hands. Any time you see a nurse, you see a bottle of hand lotion because they wash their hands so much.”

But thanks to those earlier conservation efforts, “I think we’re going to be in good shape,” he said. Cedars-Sinai uses more than 200 million gallons of water a year.

Up in picturesque Carmel, which like the rest of the central coast was hit earlier and harder by the drought, those mall bathroom signs have proven quite popular.

“We have a lot of requests for those signs,” said Mary O’Sullivan, spokeswoman for The Barnyard shopping center. “People want to put them in their homes.”

Times staff writers Maria La Ganga and Marla Cone contributed to this story.

USERS OF WATER IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA Irrigation: 1.5% Unaccounted: 9.2% Single family homes: 34.4% Apartments: 25% Commercial / Institutional: 25% Government: 5.1% Manufacturing: 6% WATER USE SOUTHER CALIFORNIA The leading commercial and institutional users of MWD water Schools: 15.01% Hospitals: 13.2% Hotels / Motels: 11.1% Amusement / Recreation: 9.5% Colleges / Universities: 7.68% Nursing Homes: 4.75% Restaurants: 4.4% Public Administrations: 4.36% Laundries: 4.16% Real Estate Developments: 3.93% The leading manufacturing users of MWD water Electronics: 10.84% Aircraft: 9.72% Petroleum refining: 8.29% Preserved fruits: 6.61% Beverages: 6.23% Paper mills: 5.12% Guided missiles: 4.87% Communication: 4.15% Textile finishing: 2.55% Metal products: 2.27% Office / Computing eq: 2.17% Ships / Boats: 2.1% Dairy: 1.85% Note: Other manufacturing users make up 33.23% of total. Source: Metropolitan Water District survey