Circle of Blue: Taking the pulse of global freshwater issues
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 16, 2010 at 5:03 amFrom the Circle of Blue Water News:
“March 22, 2010 marks World Water Day, a 24-hour observance held annually since 1993 to draw attention to the role that freshwater plays in the world. In recent years it has focused global concern on the dwindling supply of clean water.
With governments from Australia to India feeling the heat of dryness like never before, multinational corporations pledging to become better global water citizens, and a multitude of nonprofit organizations gaining position in the councils of influence worldwide, the global freshwater crisis is steadily becoming a top public priority.
In January, global business and elected leaders assembled in Davos at the World Economic Forum learned one more striking fact that underlies international concern. By 2030, WEF experts said, people will withdraw 30 percent more water than nature can replenish. Unless practices for using and conserving water shift dramatically, shortages will hit communities and businesses, especially agriculture, which uses 70 percent of the world’s fresh water.
Here is some of what we expect in what promises to be a busy year in the world of water … “
Read more from the Circle of Blue Water News by clicking here.
Scientists see fresh evidence of more water on the moon
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 9, 2010 at 8:54 amHey! More water for California! From the New York Times:
“The top of the moon is icy, too.
Over the past year, scientists have found more and more convincing evidence that the moon, once thought desert dry, holds significant amounts of water ice within the deep, eternally dark craters near the south pole. The evidence turned conclusive with the deliberate crash of a NASA spacecraft into one of the craters last October, kicking up about 26 gallons of water.
The effort focused on the south pole, with its larger and deeper craters, but last week, scientists reported there is also ice in craters near the north pole.
And not just a dusting of frost. Within 40 small craters, one to nine miles wide, they estimated 600 million metric tons of water. Perhaps most notably, “It has to be relatively pure,” said Paul Spudis, the principal investigator for the instrument that made the discovery. … “
Read more from the New York Times by clicking here.
Commentary: Believing in free water and Father Christmas
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 6, 2010 at 5:31 amFrom Global Water Intelligence, this commentary (h/t to Aguanomics):
“There seems to be a widespread belief that water – like oil – is running out, and that this is the cause of the global water crisis. Of course it is wrong – water is endlessly renewable, and we currently use only a tiny fraction of what is available, but it does beg the question, what is this global water crisis that people seem to talk about?
I have been thinking about this as we pull together our mammoth Global Water Market 2011 report for publication next month. Although the core of the report is 50 in-depth country profiles which look at the unique challenges and opportunities in each country, it does give an interesting overview of the world, and my job has been to write some essays about the general themes.
The conclusion that I have come to is that this sense of a “water crisis” is really about the political realisation in many parts of the world that we cannot continue to live as if water availability were not a restraint on our activities. It is a bit like coming to terms with the fact that Santa Claus does not exist.
For years, politicians and engineers have worked to create the illusion that abundant water is part of nature’s bounty, wherever in the world it is required. It was easier to maintain the pretence of plentiful water in the past. In the US, for example, large dams and water transfer projects could be financed through federal government borrowing, paid off through taxation over the decades, and hardly noticed by the general populace. In the Middle East, governments turned to thermal desalination plants, but generally avoided passing on the cost to the customer. In India, the illusion of cheap and plentiful water was created by the provision of free electricity to pump groundwater. … “
Continue reading this commentary from Global Water Intelligence by clicking here.
Pedal-powered nanofiltration kits sent to Haiti
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 1, 2010 at 6:27 amFrom Desalination & Water Reuse:
“Researchers from the Department of Environmental Science & Engineering at South Korea’s Gwangju Institute of Science & Technology (GIST) sent several human-powered nanofiltration (NF) water- treatment systems to the earthquake victims of Haiti in January.
One unit is capable of producing about 13 L/min of safe potable water from untreated water passed through a cartridge pre-filter and then a commercial-sized NF membrane module (2.5 in diameter; 40 in long). Electricity is not required because the pressure needed to pump water is generated by pedaling the device like a bicycle or using a handpump.
This makes them ideal for disaster-stricken and third world countries where electricity is usually inaccessible and water scarcity is a serious threat. … “
Read more from Desalination & Water Reuse by clicking here.
An ugly truth: The future is dim for the world’s homeliest fish
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on February 2, 2010 at 8:09 am
Yeah, that’s one ugly fish! I have seen that picture before and always figured it was photoshop, but apparently not! Unforunately, things aren’t looking so good for the blobfish, according to Scientific American:
“Can’t the blobfish (Psychrolutes marcidus) get some love? This ugly, gelatinous, inedible fish now risks extinction thanks to humans trawling marine murky depths for lobsters and crabs.
Blobfish live at depths of 800 meters off the southeastern coast of Australia. The species has a very limited habitat, and can’t survive elsewhere. … “
Read more from Scientific American by clicking here.
Proposed aqueduct would quench Baja wine valley
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on February 2, 2010 at 6:13 amFrom the San Diego Union Tribune:
“TIJUANA — As they watch millions of gallons of treated Tijuana wastewater flow into the Pacific Ocean each day, Baja California authorities say they have a better idea: Why not pipe it to the Guadalupe Valley, Baja California’s winemaking region, where the water table has been falling even as the area has risen in international renown?
Gov. José Guadalupe Osuna Millán’s government is proposing a 46-mile aqueduct that would carry the treated water from eastern Tijuana to the vineyards and olive groves in the small agricultural valley north of Ensenada.
“If we wanted to use all the treated water in the city, we’d be hard-pressed to find places to put it, no matter how many green areas we had,” said Efraín Muñoz, head of the State Water Commission, Baja California’s water planning agency. … “
Read more from the San Diego Union Tribune by clicking here.
Australian water crisis offers clues for California
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on January 16, 2010 at 7:09 amFrom the Los Angeles Times’ Greenspace blog:
“When California water officials look into the future, many of them see Australia: a vast, arid continent that has been suffering through drought for more than a decade. Severe shortages have prompted Australia to implement strict water-saving measures throughout the country. It has required residents to use less water in their homes, caused government to build large-scale desalination plants and led farmers to implement drip irrigation systems.
Australia, it seems, could offer a model of how to adapt in California, where, despite this weekend’s rains, the state remains in a third year of drought — a drought many water officials expect not only will continue but continue to be exacerbated by a growing population and climate change considerations.
Recognizing that California and Australia are “inextricably linked to the serious changes and challenges of an accelerating decreasing availability of water and its supply juxtaposed to the demands of ever increasing populations,” according to Grame Barty, regional director of the Americans for the Australian Trade Commission, the L.A.-based commission hosted a one-day event Thursday to bring together water sustainability experts from both sides of the Pacific in what it hopes “will become an important annual exchange of issues and solutions between the USA and Australia.” It’s part of the annual G’Day USA: Australia Week celebration. … “
More from the Greenspace blog by clicking here.
Peter Gleick: Water for Haiti: Now – How you can help out
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on January 14, 2010 at 7:49 amFrom Peter Gleick at the City Brights blog:
“Information on the disaster in Haiti is only slowly coming out, but it is clear that the magnitude and extent of the catastrophe is vast, in a land seemingly cursed by endless environmental destruction.
I urge people to make donations to whatever organizations they trust to deliver help. I’ve donated to the American Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders, but there are many more.
In any disaster like this, after search, rescue, and immediate medical care, clean and safe water becomes a critical need. Without it, water-related diseases rapidly become a serious health threat for the survivors.
Water Number: 50 liters per person per day. In previous work I’ve done on basic human needs, I’ve identified 50 liters per person per day as a minimum for drinking, sanitation, cooking, and cleaning. In a disaster of this magnitude, even a fraction of that amount would be a blessing. Emergency water supplies can be provided in many ways, but there is no consistent approach or technology. Here are some that should be applied quickly: … “
Read more from Peter Gleick at the City Brights blog by clicking here. And please, donate to either the American Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders, or any other bona fide aid organization if you can.
Peter Gleick: Water, climate change, and international security
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on January 11, 2010 at 3:49 pmFrom Peter Gleick at the City Brights blog:
“It would be nice if water resources fell neatly into national political boundaries. It would be nice if countries that shared water resources cooperated more. It would be nice if climate change wasn’t a growing threat to the stocks and flows of water around the world.
But, alas, things aren’t always nice. And these three problems — climate change, shared international water resources, and security and conflict — are coming together in ways that raise serious concerns. Climate changes will inevitably affect water resources around the world, altering water availability, quality, and the management of infrastructure. Indeed, they already are. A new report, released today by the Pacific Institute and funded by the United Nations Environment Programme, looks at the growing risks of conflict over transboundary water resources as a result of climate change. We conclude that climate change will almost certainly increase the risks of conflicts over shared water resources, not lessen them. … “
Continue reading Peter Gleick’s post at the City Brights blog by clicking here.
Will the next war be fought over water?
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on January 4, 2010 at 8:12 amFrom National Public Radio:
“Just as wars over oil played a major role in 20th-century history, a new book makes a convincing case that many 21st-century conflicts will be fought over water.
In Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power and Civilization, journalist Steven Solomon argues that water is surpassing oil as the world’s scarcest critical resource.
Only 2.5 percent of the planet’s water supply is fresh, Solomon writes, much of which is locked away in glaciers. World water use in the past century grew twice as fast as world population.
“We’ve now reached the limit where that trajectory can no longer continue,” Solomon tells NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly. “Suddenly we’re going to have to find a way to use the existing water resources in a far, far more productive manner than we ever did before, because there’s simply not enough.” … “
Continue reading or listen to the story at the NPR website by clicking here.
Big Picture: Five years since the Tsunami
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on December 30, 2009 at 7:54 am
From the Boston Globe’s Big Picture blog:
“Five years ago, on Boxing Day, December 26th, 2004, a magnitude 9.3 earthquake hit the seafloor of the Indian Ocean, causing tremendous waves of seawater to rush ashore as devastating tsunamis that left 230,000 people dead across 13 different countries – the fifth deadliest natural disaster in recorded history. Over 45,000 of the dead were never found.
Five years later now, reconstruction moves apace, as multiple aid groups have built more than 140,000 homes, 1,700 schools, 3,800 houses of worship and 3,700 km of roads. On this anniversary of the catastrophe, we have collected here photographs of survivors, some rebuilding, some remembering, and seven sets of “before and after” photos (numbers 4-10, be sure to click them to see the transition effect). … “
Do be sure to check out the before and after pictures as mentioned above. The transition effect is very cool! Check out this photo gallery from the Boston Globe’s Big Picture blog by clicking here.
Peter Gleick on water and conflict: The new water conflict chronology
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on December 10, 2009 at 7:56 amFrom Peter Gleick at the City Brights blog:
“In an ongoing effort to understand the connections between water resources, water systems, and international security and conflict, the Pacific Institute initiated a project in the late 1980s to track and categorize events related to water and conflict. This Water Conflict Chronology has been continuously updated since then, and I publish a version in each volume of our biennial water book (The World’s Water published by Island Press, Washington DC). Today, for the first time in two decades, we are releasing the Chronology in a completely revamped format.
Water Number: 203. The Pacific Institute’s newly designed Water Conflict Chronology now has 203 entries (as of today), ranging from 5,000 years ago up to the death of a man in riots over water cuts in Mumbai, India last week.
The newly released Chronology can be viewed in a number of different ways, from a table with full citations to interactive Google Earth water conflict maps (see image below). An interactive timeline is also available that permits users to filter the Chronology by type of conflict, date, and region. … “
Read more from Peter Gleick at the City Brights blog by clicking here.
Water Wired: Winter 2009 Stygoscape Issue: Groundwater, gossip, and the Guaraní Aquifer
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on December 8, 2009 at 6:52 am
From the Water Wired Blog:
“Like water conspiracy theories? Who doesn’t?
If you do, or even if you don’t, check out the Winter 2009 issue of Stygoscape, the newsletter of the Transboundary Ground Water Interest Group (TBGWIG) of the National Ground Water Association.
The featured aquifer is the Guaraní aquifer of South America, considered by some the largest single liquid freshwater body in the world, larger than either Lake Baikal or the North American Great Lakes. … “
Apparently, many, including Maude Barlow, think that the U.S. is trying to get control of the Guarani aquifer. Get the link to the issue and find out more from Water Wired by clicking here.
The Rip Van Winkle of water projects – NAWAPA remerges after a 50 year slumber
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on December 5, 2009 at 7:29 amFrom Barry Nelson at the NRDC Switchboard blog:
“Wow. A communications firm in Falls Church Virginia has suggested reviving a continent-spanning water project called the North American Water and Power Alliance as a jobs creation project for the nation.
It won’t be built, but if you’ve never heard of NAWAPA, it’s worth revisiting this moment in water history. NAWAPA is one of the largest water projects ever proposed — conceived in 1960s by Parsons Engineering in Southern California. (Full disclosure. My brother worked at Parsons for years, but not on water. He stubbornly resisted my repeated requests that he pilfer anything related to NAWAPA from the firm’s archives.) The project would have dammed and reversed the flow of the Yukon and other rivers. Tunnels, pumping stations and canals would have moved water along the Rocky Mountains to the desert southwest. It even featured a “nuclear excavation” option, to speed the process of blasting mountains out of the way. I recall reading about this project as a child. (When I was 10, my grandmother gave me a subscription to Popular Mechanics.) I thought it was really cool. … “
Ginormous Canada to U.S. water diversion project touted at White House jobs summit as source of jobs, hyrdopower, irrigation
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on December 4, 2009 at 7:45 am
From Water Online:
“Washington, DC /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — In the context of the White House Jobs Summit underway today, plans were announced today to re-launch a push for a decades-old, large-scale water diversion project that would create tens of thousands of new jobs, bring massive sums of fresh water to the southwestern U.S., potentially irrigate thousands of acres of arid land, increase planetary respiration to counter global warming, and yield a massive abundance of clean hydro-electric power.
The “North American Water and Power Alliance” (NAWAPA) was developed by the Ralph Parsons Engineering Company of Southern California in the early 1970s. Extensive engineering studies were done to establish the feasibility of diverting fresh water from powerful northern-flowing rivers in Alaska and Northern Canada southward through the Rockies into the southwestern U.S. and Northern Mexico. Seen as a major “Work Projects Administration (WPA)”-style undertaking, NAWAPA would create thousands of jobs at all skill levels and yield enormous beneficial results. … “
Read more from Water Online by clicking here.
Find out more about NAWAPA by clicking here.
Afternoon update: Report on global water resources warns of rising water demand
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on November 23, 2009 at 2:45 pmFrom the New York Times Green, Inc.:
“A report on global water resources released Monday said that governments must address booming water demand or face grave human, environmental and economic consequences.
“Water needs to rise up the totem pole of political discourse,’’ said Giulio Boccaletti of McKinsey, the consulting firm that wrote the report, during a press conference. “We need to stop flying blind in making decisions about water without a map on the table.’’
The report, Charting Our Water Future, says that that in 20 years, water demand will be 40 percent higher than it is today, and more than 50 percent higher in the most rapidly developing countries. Historic rates of supply expansion and efficiency improvement will close only a fraction of this gap. … “
Read more from the New York Times Green, Inc. blog by clicking here.
In the Netherlands, what if the water wins?
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on November 20, 2009 at 7:51 am
From Time Magazine:
“Just downstream from the Dutch Port of Rotterdam, a storm-surge barrier waits for the seas to rise. Twin latticework arms, each as long as the Eiffel Tower and twice as heavy, stand ready to swing together to shield the city from the wind-whipped waves. Together, they form one of the longest moving structures in the world.
The Maeslant Barrier, or Maeslantkering, is the culmination of an effort initiated in the wake of a 1953 flood, when a storm surge overwhelmed the country’s dikes and killed 1,800 people. Completed in 1997, the $7.5 billion Delta Works — a series of dams, dikes, locks and gates — was designed to put a permanent end to flooding in a country where two-thirds of the population lives below sea level. “The general idea was that water would never be a threat to the Netherlands again,” says Tineke Huizinga, Vice Minister for Transport, Public Works and Water Management.
But even as the great barrier was being tested, it was becoming clear that climate change would one day make the effort obsolete. … “
Read more from Time Magazine by clicking here.
Dispatch from down under: Action on water policy is a mirage
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on October 11, 2009 at 10:04 pmFrom newmatilda.com, an Australian website, this commentary:
“The most effective action by the Federal Government on water policy has been to make people think something useful is being done, writes Kellie Tranter
Sorry to interrupt the high-five sessions going on over our world-beating economic performance, but aren’t we forgetting something? Ask an economist and they’ll say no; ask a realist and they’ll remind you that water underpins everything.
How much food can our farmers produce without water? How many ASX listed companies currently are significantly overvalued because of their reliance on the availability of cheap water to generate current profits?
I found it ironic last week when our Deputy Prime Minister — live from Los Angeles — conceded on Lateline that “we share a lot of things with California [as] parts of the world that have to deal with water scarcity”, praised actions taken by California’s elected representatives and then completely failed to mention that in February this year the Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, declared a water shortage state of emergency. …”
Read more from newmatilda.com by clicking here.
How will the world feed itself in 40 years’ time? By 2050, the predicted world population will require the resources of two Earths to sustain it; How can we possibly meet these demands?
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on October 11, 2009 at 7:43 amFrom the Guardian U.K., this commentary by Alex Renton:
“The world is going to get hungrier this century, and on a scale that will make the famines of the 1980s look paltry. The maths are simple and devastating: in 40 years’ time the global population will be 9.2 billion people – a third larger than it is now. But to feed us all, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization says, we will need to produce twice as much food.
That’s because, despite the threats of this century, most developing countries will get richer. At present 350m households in the world live on £8,000 a year or more. That figure is projected to increase to 2.1bn by 2030. And the richer they are, the more wastefully people eat. Generally the poor eat vegetables, while the rich eat food that eats vegetables. Lots of it. To produce 1kg of beef takes 10kg of grass or soya-based feed. A farmed fish will have eaten three times its weight in wild fish. And the rate at which the richest consume these things is amazing: Americans consume 120kg of meat each per year; in the developing world they eat 28kg.
If the world develops as economists predict, it is hard to see how we can possibly meet these demands: environmentalists like to say that the 2050 population would require the resources of two earths to sustain it. No wonder the British government’s chief scientific adviser John Beddington says: “Food security represents a greater threat to mankind than climate change itself.” …”
Read more from the Guardian U.K. by clicking here.
Water scarcity will create global security concerns; ‘We have very little time,’ says Nobel winner
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on October 8, 2009 at 7:11 amFrom YubaNet.com:
“Water scarcity as a result of climate change will create far-reaching global security concerns, says Dr. Rajendra K. Pachauri, chair of the intergovernmental panel on climate change, a co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.
Pachauri spoke this morning at the 2009 Nobel Conference at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, MN.
“At one level the world’s water is like the world’s wealth. Globally, there is more than enough to go round. The problem is that some countries get a lot more than others,” he says. “With 31 percent of global freshwater resources, Latin America has 12 times more water per person than South Asia. Some places, such as Brazil and Canada, get far more water than they can use; others, such as countries in the Middle East, get much less than they need.”
And the effects of a warmer world will likely include changes in water availability.
“Up to 1.2 billion people in Asia, 250 million Africans and 81 million Latin Americans will be exposed to increased water stress by 2020,” Pachauri says. Water shortages have an enormous impact of human health, including malnutrition, pathogen or chemical loading, infectious disease from water contamination, and uncontrolled water reuse.
“Due to the very large number of people that may be affected, food and water scarcity may be the most important health consequences of climate change,” Pachauri says. …”
Read more from YubaNet.com by clicking here.
Monday’s top of the scroll is …
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 21, 2009 at 7:54 amWould you believe it is actually a slow news day …? I can’t find any story of statewide interest today. There was, of course, plenty over the weekend. However, here’s a few interesting non-California stories.
From NPR:
“The construction of mobile floodgates aims to safeguard the 1,300-year-old island city of Venice. It’s an ambitious engineering project, but some scientists say it may not be sufficient to protect Venice from rising sea levels due to climate change.
Venice rose from mudflats in the middle of a lagoon which forms the largest wetland in the Mediterranean. One of the world’s most endangered cities, it has been subject to increasing flooding due to sinking land — but also to rising sea levels.
It’s known as “aqua alta” — high water — and it brings city life to a standstill for several hours. Big boats can’t go under low-hanging bridges, and water seeps into buildings through the sewage system. Venetians have not lived on the ground floor for decades. …”
Read more from NPR by clicking here.
From the Peninsula Daily (Washington):
“The giant Humboldt squid that invaded North Olympic Peninsula waters earlier this month apparently have taken to beaching themselves.
Observers in Clallam Bay and Sekiu say that hundreds of the large squid — which can grow to six-feet-long and weigh up to 70 pounds — have littered the beaches each morning since Wednesday.
“There had to be 100 of them laying all over the beach,” said Chris Mohr, owner of Van Riper’s Resort in Sekiu on Friday.
“It was like a graveyard out there.” …”
More from the Peninsula Daily by clicking here.
Cuba faces toilet paper shortage
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 14, 2009 at 7:52 amNow this is a crisis!!! From the Miami Herald:
” There’s good news and bad news in Cuba.
The bad news: There’s a shortage of toilet paper, and officials in Havana say it will not ease until the end of the year.
The good news: Day-old copies of the Communist party’s newspaper Granma, a traditional substitute, are available for less than a U.S. penny. And that’s six to eight full, if rough, pages per day.
Cuban officials say the shortage is the result of the global financial crisis and three devastating hurricanes last summer, which forced cuts in imports as well as domestic production because of reductions in electricity and imports of raw materials.
But CNN commentator Fareed Zakaria says that “at the bottom of this toilet paper shortage is Cuba’s continuing commitment to its bizarro world of socialist economics.” …”
Read more from the Miami Herald by clicking here.
Picture gallery of the Sayano-Shushenskaya dam accident
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 9, 2009 at 12:25 pm
This is the Sayano-Shushenskaya dam located in south central Russia in better days. Check out this picture gallery from the Boston Globe’s Big Picture on the accident in the turbine and transformer rooms of the hydroelectric plant at the dam on August 17 .
Mexico water shortage becomes crisis amid drought: Crops are wilting in the countryside, and the capital’s water shortage has turned dire as Mexico grapples with its worst drought in more than half a century
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 7, 2009 at 7:55 amFrom the Los Angeles Times:
“Reporting from Mexico City – In the parched Mexican countryside, the corn is wilting, the wheat stunted. And here in this vast and thirsty capital, officials are rationing water and threatening worse cuts as Mexico endures one of the driest spells in more than half a century.
A months-long drought has affected broad swaths of the country, from the U.S. border to the Yucatan Peninsula, leaving crop fields parched and many reservoirs low. The need for rain is so dire that water officials have been rooting openly for a hurricane or two to provide a good drenching. “We really are in a difficult situation,” said Felipe Arreguin Cortes, deputy technical director for Mexico’s National Water Commission.
This is supposed to be Mexico’s wet season, when daily rains bathe farmland and top off rivers and reservoirs. But rainfall has been sporadic and unusually light — the result, officials say, of an El Niño effect this summer that has warmed Pacific Ocean waters and influenced distant weather patterns. …”
Read more from the Los Angeles Times by clicking here.
Australia’s water scarcity started 15 years ago
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 31, 2009 at 5:49 amFrom Water Online:
“New analysis shows that the water scarcity being experienced in southeast Australia started up to 15 years ago. While the results from the work by senior CSIRO researcher, Dr Albert van Dijk, may not surprise many people, it provides scientific evidence of the shift.
The finding follows the first ever national and comprehensive analysis of 30 years of on-ground and satellite observations of Australia’s water resources.
Dr Albert van Dijk told the the Sixth International Scientific Conference on the Global Energy and Water Cycle in Melbourne today that the analysis provides a valuable, new insight into the country’s water balance. “The data shows the first signs of diminishing water availability in Australia appeared somewhere between 1993 and 1996 when the rate of water resource capture and use started to exceed the rate of streamflow supply,” Dr van Dijk said. …”
Read more from Water Online by clicking here.
Dry run: Learning from Australia’s drought – Australia’s 10-year drought provides a glimpse of our own thirsty future if we don’t conserve and recycle water now
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 30, 2009 at 8:13 pmFrom MyDesert.com:
“Does the idea of taking a shower alongside a strategically placed bucket, then running outside to water your plants, sound appealing to you? How about the ticking of a shower timer counting down your remaining seconds while you hurriedly rinse out that last bit of shampoo? Those are some of the drastic measures Australians are forced to take because of tight governmental restrictions after a decade of drought.
Brisbane, Queensland, resident Tanya Graves, a lawyer turned full-time mom, no longer gets to enjoy watching her kids cavorting on the Slip ‘n Slide or running through the sprinklers. Forget about watering the yard. “Our rationing has slowly changed,” she reports. “It started with watering of gardens being limited more and more. Firstly, odd-numbered houses could only water every other day, then only from 4–7 p.m. This progressed on to watering by bucket only. At the worst stage they did not allow watering of gardens at all,” says Graves. In addition, “The ‘powers that be’ have recommended 4 minutes maximum per person for showers and even gave everyone free timers.” …”
Read more from MyDesert.com by clicking here.
World Water Week: Climate change requires better water management, say experts
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 23, 2009 at 10:52 amFrom the Voice of America:
“In Stockholm, Sweden, the annual World Water Week conference ended Friday with a strong call for protection of water resources. Participants endorsed a statement saying water must play a central role in UN climate change negotiations, known as COP-15, scheduled for Copenhagen in December.
Cecelia Martinsen, director of World Water Week, says the conference is usually a platform for delegates to exchange experiences and ideas. Normally, a final communiqué is not issued. But this year is different.
“This year with the climate change negotiations…we felt as water professionals that we needed to send a clear message to those negotiations in order to make sure that water is considered when it comes to the climate change adaptation and mitigations,” she says. …”
Read more from the Voice of America by clicking here.
Peter Gleick: An international water perspective – Water in crisis
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 18, 2009 at 7:25 amFrom Peter Gleick’s City Brights blog:
“I’m spending the week at the Stockholm Water Symposium, an international meeting involving over 2,000 people from over 130 countries. The annual Stockholm symposium is 19 years old and is one of the best international water meetings around. I love going — though I haven’t been for many years — because it helps me recharge and refocus away from the narrow and local controversies around water in the western United States to a more global perspective. This year, more than most, I have been struck by the remarkable progress in thinking about water made globally, especially compared with the slow progress made in California over the past decade.
Viewed from the outside (and perhaps from the inside), California is no longer a world leader on water. While remarkable and innovate efforts at sustainable water management are still being pursued here and there in California and the United States, these efforts are no longer either unusual or groundbreaking. And for some issues, such as improving water efficiency, developing and applying new water treatment technology, addressing water poverty, reducing the impacts of overuse and water pollution, and using smart economics, efforts outside of the U.S. are often far more advanced. In many ways, we’ve fallen a decade behind — well, maybe eight years behind. …”
Read the rest of Peter Gleick’s post at the City Brights blog by clicking here.
Water tops climate change as global priority; International survey finds fresh water pollution, scarcity drive public concern
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 18, 2009 at 7:23 amFrom Circle of Blue Water News:
“By day Valentin Pérez Hernandez, a 24-year-old gardener in Mexico City, tends the borders and beds, the soil and seed, the red-flowering bushes and lushly scented paths that wind through the Jardines del Pedregal, one of the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods. Though his cart is filled with weeders, shovels and shears, Hernandez’ most important tool is the clean fresh water that pours from the end of his garden hose.
By night Hernandez joins millions of Mexico City residents, working and poor, whose lives are disrupted daily by water shortages, sewage spills, contamination and waterborne disease. Public mismanagement and an old and fractured plumbing network are no longer capable of consistently delivering enough clean, safe fresh water to much of the world’s third largest metropolitan region.
“I have a lot of indignation for the political leaders for not paying attention to the fact that many of us do not have water,” Hernandez said. “We have gone up to 15 days without water. This is not fair because everyone is not doing their part. More than anything, people are not conscious of this.”
He added: “I don’t have words to describe this problem. Without water we are nothing. Without water this world wouldn’t exist. Without water we can’t do anything. So it’s the most important.” …”
Read more from Circle of Blue Water News by clicking here.
As India water and power dry up, the people revolt: Hundreds of times a week across the nation, frustrated residents block roads and demand resources, but there’s simply not enough to go around
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 13, 2009 at 10:18 pm
From the Los Angeles Times:
“Reporting from Viratnagar, India – The rage surged through the crowd, mixing with the heat, the sweat and the frustration to create a volatile stew, as several hundred locals incensed over power and water shortages blocked the main Alwar Road here Wednesday.
Most residents said they hadn’t seen a lightbulb’s worth of energy come through their wires in the last 60 hours, and this after suffering protracted cuts for the last month. With no power to pump well water, some said they had to walk miles to find a hand pump. Others said they were paying up to a third of their meager incomes to price-gouging drivers of water trucks.
Localized eruptions like this one, most unreported, occur hundreds of times each week across India, where this year the situation has been made worse by unusually light monsoon rains. The states of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Bihar and Rajasthan are among the hardest-hit areas.
Experts say the shortages could be the result of global warming or natural cycles. That hasn’t provided much solace to farmers like these in eastern Rajasthan as they watch their crops die, their livelihoods wither, their children go thirsty. …”
Read more from the Los Angeles Times by clicking here.
Space images forewarn of Indian groundwater crisis, study says
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 12, 2009 at 11:25 pmFrom Bloomberg News:
“Orbiting satellites measuring the gravitational pull of water below the earth’s surface confirm what authorities in India suspected for more than 20 years: groundwater is shrinking in some of the nation’s driest areas.
Water equal to the maximum held by Lake Mead, the biggest reservoir in the U.S., was depleted from underground supplies of three northwest Indian states between August 2002 and October 2008, scientists said in the journal Nature yesterday.
The findings suggest that pumping water from wells for irrigation is damaging India’s resources more than the government has estimated. Without measures to curb demand, dwindling groundwater supplies may cause drinking-water shortages and erode crop production in a region inhabited by 114 million people, the authors said. …”
Read more from Bloomberg News by clicking here.
Daily Kos: Water bankruptcy possible within 20 years
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 27, 2009 at 7:24 amFrom the Daily Kos (a blog):
The World Economic Forum (WEF) issued a report (pdf file) warning that in less than 20 years the world may face a water bankruptcy of fresh water shortages so huge and pervasive that “global food production could crater” as the world could “lose the equivalent of the entire grain production of the US and India combined.” The report warns that half of our global population will be affected by water shortages, millions will die, and water wars will increase over shrinking supplies. The gravity of the water crisis is exacerbated by the interrelationship between water and economic growth, political stability, health, food, alternative energy, climate change, human rights and life itself.
The WEF report warns that our water bubble is as “unsustainable and fragile as that which precipitated the collapse in world financial markets” and may result in a water “bankruptcy in many places with no way of paying the debt back.”
The problem is that water is a finite resource, yet government and management policies are based on the erroneous assumption that a renewable resource means the supply is inexhaustible. The reality is policy makers do not evaluate water sustainability within the confluence of population growth, increased irrigation for food, energy water needs, waste, mismanagement and pollution of water supplies.
Drought is often discussed in terms of rainfall amounts, but it is the hydrologic conditions (pdf file) in the context of intertwined external factors — such as environmental mandates, development, population growth — that create water shortages that may exist even in plentiful wet years.
Read more from the Daily Kos by clicking here.
The Canadian & USA Grand Canal Project
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 27, 2009 at 7:17 am
From Seeker 401, a blog:
The Great Recycling and Northern Development (GRAND) Canal of North America or GCNA is a water management proposal designed by Newfoundland engineer Thomas Kierans to alleviate North American freshwater shortage problems (see Water politics). The GCNA, which relies upon water management technologies used in the Zuider Zee and California Aqueduct, has been promoted by Kierans since 1959.
This plan arose as water quality issues threatened the Great Lakes and other vital areas in Canada and the United States . Kierans proposes that to avoid a water crisis from future droughts in Canada and the United States, in addition to water conservation, acceptable new fresh water sources must be found.
The premise of the GCNA is that fresh water run-off from natural precipitation be collected in James Bay by means of a series of outflow-only, sea level dikes-constructed across the northern end of James Bay. This would capture the fresh water before it mixes with the salty water of Hudson Bay. In the second phase of the GRAND Canal proposal a percentage of the captured fresh water run-off would be transferred by a series of canals and pumping stations south to the Great Lakes where it would be available to be transferred to water deficit areas of Canada and the United States. Precipitation run-off from the U.S. and Canada averages about 160,000 m3 per second[citation needed], or the flow of 28 Niagara Rivers. Sixty percent occurs in Canada, which has only 10% of both nations’ total population.
Peeling back pavement to expose watery havens
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 17, 2009 at 6:49 amFrom the New York Times:
SEOUL, South Korea — For half a century, a dark tunnel of crumbling concrete encased more than three miles of a placid stream bisecting this bustling city.
The waterway had been a centerpiece of Seoul since a king of the Choson Dynasty selected the new capital 600 years ago, enticed by the graceful meandering of the stream and its 23 tributaries. But in the industrial era after the Korean War, the stream, by then a rank open sewer, was entombed by pavement and forgotten beneath a lacework of elevated expressways as the city’s population swelled toward 10 million.
Today, after a $384 million recovery project, the stream, called Cheonggyecheon, is liberated from its dank sheath and burbles between reedy banks. Picnickers cool their bare feet in its filtered water, and carp swim in its tranquil pools.
The restoration of the Cheonggyecheon is part of an expanding environmental effort in cities around the world to “daylight” rivers and streams by peeling back pavement that was built to bolster commerce and serve automobile traffic decades ago.
Read more from the New York Times by clicking here.
Monday evening update: Making the case for the human right to water
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 6, 2009 at 11:08 pmSorry, folks, got distracted this afternoon, and didn’t have a chance to finish the afternoon update. Here’s some of it; the most interesting stuff I will save for tomorrow morning’s posting! From the San Francisco Chronicle, this commentary:
Most of us assume we’ll have the water we need to survive, especially in California. Think again.
Access to safe, affordable and clean water is hardly a given in the Central Valley and parts of the Central Coast. In these communities, more than 90 percent of drinking water is from contaminated groundwater. In Delano (Kern County), the water is undrinkable, yet poor residents pay between $20 and $45 per month for it. All told, more than 150,000 California residents lack safe water for drinking, bathing and washing dishes; even more have water service disconnected because they cannot afford to pay their bill.
The concept of a human right to water is a hot topic at the United Nations and in international circles. But what does a human right to water really mean?
Interestingly enough, the prime opponent of guaranteeing a human right to water has been the United States. It is this political dynamic of our federal government opposing human rights to not only water, but food and housing as well, that makes AB1242 by Assemblyman Ira Ruskin, D-Redwood City, so interesting. The key vote on this bill is today.
Read more of this commentary by clicking here.
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