In Southern California there are about a million swimming pools that are rarely used. Many were installed as a way to keep cool before central air conditioning was common. Some were built for “the kids’ who are now grown and gone. And some were built as a fashion statement. It is time to rethink this costly environmental burden on our urban landscape and create new and more acceptable uses for this installed base. This is a huge opportunity to do good and make a lot of money.

I have spent the last week or so talking to people about his opportunity and have come up with a list of ideas for converting the unused private pool into at least usable space and at best an environmental positive.

• Spa Grotto. Empty the pool cut a walkway down to the deep end install a spa and a fern garden with a small waterfall. Very romantic. The pool would be restorable if the next owner of the house had children
• Pond. Lower maintenance and chemical cost by changing the pool into a ecologically balanced mini-lake. Create wildlife habitat and a beautiful visual in the yard
• Reservoir. Lease some of the million unused swimming pools to the MWD (Metropolitan Water District) to use as a part of the reservoir system. With water shortages looming more storage capacity would be a big help.
• Grey Water System. Use the pool as a biological filter to clean up the non-toilet waste water from a home. The naturally purified waste water would be used to water the homes landscaping.
• Basement. Most home in the west don’t have a basement. Empty the swimming pool install a sump pump in the bottom of it and a deck over the top and create a couple of rooms of storage space and increase the size of the yard at the same time.
• Energy Farm. Any swimming pool owner knows that without chemicals the pool will fill with algae in a very short time. This process is a natural conversion of the suns energy into bio-mass. Install collectors for the algae and a small still for converting it into backyard ethanol and you could be making your own gasoline.
• Pump Storage. Find a neighbor with a pool that is a hundred feet different in elevation from yours. Make a deal with the electric company. Use cheap electricity at night to pump the water up the hill and run a generator with the water flowing down the hill during the high demand part of the day to power your air conditioner.

I don’t know which of these ideas will work. But I do know that swimming pools that aren’t used are a cost and they will be converted to more economically and ecologically sensible uses. Brilliant.