Water Education Foundation
This is just one post in the National water news Category
Click here to view all posts

U.S. faces era of water scarcity: Profligate use hurts in unexpected places

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 9, 2008 at 7:37 am

From the Circle of Blue:

Just as diminishing supplies of oil and natural gas are wrenching the economy and producing changes in lifestyles built on the principle of plenty, states and communities across the country are confronting another significant impediment to the American way of life: increased competition for scarce water.

Scientists and resource specialists say freshwater scarcity, even in unexpected places, threatens farm productivity, limits growth, increases business expenses, and drains local treasuries.

In May, for example, Brockton, Massachusetts, inaugurated a brand-new, $60 million reverse osmosis desalinization plant to supply a portion of its drinking water. The Atlantic coast city, which receives four feet of rain annually, was nevertheless so short of freshwater that it was converting brackish water into water people actually could drink.

Builders in the Southeast are confronting limits to planting gardens and lawns for new houses as a result of local water restrictions prompted by a continuing drought. The Ogallala Aquifer, the vast underground reservoir beneath the Great Plains, is steadily being depleted. California experienced the driest spring on record this year.

And scientists at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego forecast that within 13 years Lake Mead and Lake Powell along the Colorado River, the two largest reservoirs in the southwest United States, could become “dead pool” mud puddles.
…we don’t have anybody thinking long range, at the big picture…

“The whole picture is not pretty, and I don’t think that anyone has looked at the subject with the point of view of what’s sustainable,” said Tim Barnett, a research marine geophysicist at Scripps and co-author of the the study. “We don’t have anybody thinking long range, at the big picture that would put the clamps on large-scale development.”

Read more from the Circle of Blue by clicking here.

July 9, 2008 · Filed Under National water news

Comments

Leave a Reply