Jon Gertner's feature in the current Sunday New York Times magazine is a timely reminder of 1) why the Nobel Committee is giving peace prizes to environmentalists and climatologists, and 2) why (as if we needed another reason) Bjorn Lomborg is wrong when he argues mitigating climate change is a poor use of money.
Gertner begins by pointing out that while sea level rise tends to get all the attention from the long list of bad things that come with a warmer planet, the threat posed by declining freshwater supplies in places like the western half of the United States is at least as troubling.
As one prominent Western water official described the possible future to me, if some of the Southwest's largest reservoirs empty out, the region would experience an apocalypse, "an Armageddon."
That's perhaps a bit too strong a metaphor, but conflict between farms, cities and industry for dwindling water supplies is certain to grow, and if trends continue, it won't be restricted to the courtroom.
There are two problems as I see it. First, people have got to stop moving in large numbers to parts of the planet that don't have enough water. James Kunstler, for example, predicts the drying of the southwest means places like Scottsdale, Ariz., will be ghost towns in 30 years because there simply won't be any water available. That sounds a bit much, but his point is valid. Given current supplies, growing populations and rising temperatures, Scottsdale's future looks grim.
The second problem is gluttony. People use too damn much water. According to Gertner's reporting:
Water use in the United States varies widely by region, influenced by climate, neighborhood density and landscaping, among other things. In the West, Los Angelenos use about 125 gallons per person per day in their homes, compared with 114 for Tucson residents. Binney's customers [in Aurora, Colo.] generally use about 160 gallons per person per day. "In the depths of the drought," he said, "we got down to about 123 gallons."
160 gallons a day! That's crazy talk. Even Los Angeles, at 123 gpd per person is outrageously wasteful. Thanks to the fact that we pay for every gallon we use, I know exactly what my family's daily use at our house in western North Carolina is, and the typical figure is less than 44 gallons per day per person. And that's including daily showers for my wife and myself, and a bath most days for our young son. So it's not like we're going without. I suspect one of the differences is we don't water what passes for a lawn, and perhaps those LA and Aurora figures are the results of averages that include industrial and commercial usage, which we don't have in our small town. But still, the difference is astounding.
How are we going to get around the pending and current water crunches? Gertner writes of schemes like desalination plants on the west coast paid for my interior cities, which are then rewarded with larger shares of river water. But those are only stop-gap measures. Long-term solutions will require massive lifestyle changes or massive investment in dubious mega-engineering projects.
In past years, various schemes have arisen to move water from Canada or the Great Lakes to arid parts of the United States. Beyond the environmental implications and construction costs (probably hundreds of billions of dollars), such continental-scale plumbing would require stupendous amounts of electricity. And yet, fears that such plans will resurface in a drier, more populous world are partly behind current efforts by the Great Lakes states to certify a pact that protects their fresh water from outside exploitation.
Looks like it will be necessary to install a grey-water recycling system in our home one day.
UPDATE: the town of Telluride, Colo, provides solid evidence that LA's consumption is excessive:
Average per capita water usage including lawn watering for the Telluride service area is 32,850 gallons per person per year. Telluride service area water consumption averages 50 gallons of water per person per day. Telluride and Mountain Village use tiered water rates to encourage water conservation. For example residential users are San Miguel County Sustainability Inventory
charges escalating rates for water usage over 8,000 gallons in a two month period. The Town of Telluride enacted a Water conservation Code in 2003, which requires the use of high efficiency plumbing fixtures and drought tolerant landscaping with timed irrigation systems. (San Miguel County Sustainability Inventory, 2006)
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Good post. Do you know in your third to last paragraph you wrote "stap gop measures"?
You are confusing 'used in the home' with 'used per home'.
The two numbers are noticably different because the latter number include things like water used by businesses and by the government to water *their* landscaping, keep dust down at construction sites, operate public swimming pools, and all the other ways water can be used. Do you take your car to a car wash from time to time? That counts. Do you have any manufacturing facilities in your city that use water in their processes? Small farm operations (such as a dairy)? They count as well. How about the water used to raise the food crops you eat?
We use water in a myriad of ways that extend well beyond drinking it, flushing our toilets, showering and watering our lawns.
But it all adds to the total.
I'm shocked that you actually pay for water! Here I thought it was 100% well water. I know all my neighbors had wells...
(Your point on usage, of course, is still valid.)
Benjamin: Perhaps Gertner got it wrong, but he wrote "Los Angelenos use about 125 gallons per person per day in their homes," and that's exactly what I'm comparing when I write that we use 44 gallons per person per day in my home. You'll note that I did include the caveat that our usage does not include commercial and industrial consumption, just to be safe. Regardless, it would seem LA folks are just plain greedy when it comes to H2O.
I think the L.A. water usage number is way off. Most municipalities in southern CA have required multi-dwelling structures to install lowflow faucets, showerheads and toilets since the drought in the late 80's.
God awful leaf blowers are used to clean everything outdoors. Restaurants still don't put water on the table unless you ask for it.
Homeowners are very aware how expensive it is to be water wasteful, as are businesses.
I don't know where or WHEN that number comes from, but I find it highly suspicious.
www.theskinofmyteeth.com
David B.
Water can be a problem even here in the relatively lush Southeast, Atlanta is in crisis over water shortages right now. I heard on the local news this morning that an inch of rain is equivalent to about a day's worth of water supply for the city, but I'd be interested to read some stats on the average per capita water usage and how it compares to the western cities.
James, you rightly point to problems of declining water availability in the West, but besides noting the link to climate change fail to explore the real problem. It is not that people are being gluttonous or we need massive lifestyle changes or massive new infrastructure projects - it is that water use is essentially being subsidized by government systems that reflect only the blended cost of infrastructure and not the replacement costs of the water itself.
Where water is more rationally priced, people and systems can quickly adapt. This is what we need to focus on changing first, essecially as local problems are not effectively addressed by focussing on climate change.
On a larger scale, this is why Lomborg is wrong - the best way for society to increase the efficiency of fossil fuel use, CCS and move to GHG-free energy is not for governments worldwide to throw tax dollars at it, but to simply price GHG emissions (and to allow offsets for CCS). It is the lack of pricing for the costs of GHG emissions/albedo changes that effectively results in a subsidy to climate change activities (as those whose activiteis are GHG-heavy can spread the costs they create over everyone. Time to remove the subsidies.
I have the same doubt concerning the efficacy of those mega-engineering project that you found to be "dubious." However, that is exactly what the Schwarzenegger is proposing and they are exactly what even Will Durst is advertising (mp3) on behalf of the California Alliance for Jobs. Big project means more union jobs... must be good for all. But new dams and a diversion of water through the California Delta to feed even more growth of Southern California are exactly the wrong this to be doing. But, since the voters are all in Southern California, that is probably what we will get.
The LA water use figures could easily be right; I've seen several estimates that suggest 70% of the Southern California's water goes to landscaping and lawns.
Given the amount of water it takes to sustain even a smallish lawn in an arid climate (watered every other day, which isn't the norm down there) -- and the number of lawns and water-hungry landscaping in the socal desert -- I'd guess the number is quite close.
I guess this is the point where someone should update Reisner's 'Cadillac Desert' http://www.amazon.com/Cadillac-Desert-American-Disappearing-Revised/dp/…
Although, had those in power read it at the time, perhaps things might be a little better now...
I can believe the water consumption figure for L.A. It's probably the @#$% sprinklers.
Here in the Valley, built-in sprinklers are a feature of every lawn, even the grass on median strips in the roads. These sprinklers are generally controlled by timers- when we do get a decent rainy season it's common to see someone's sprinklers going full-blast in the middle of a downpour.
As for people not moving en masse to arid areas like this, there are some economic incentives in the way. If you're in my line of work and you're any damn good, the odds are that you'll end up in one of three places- L.A., NYC or Nashville- because that's where the jobs are.
Regarding global warming, a subtler (but perhaps more important) point than declining water supplies is the carbon cost of water usage. In a recent podcast (which you can hear on my website), Bill Cooper, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Irvine, said that water is the "low-hanging fruit" for reducing carbon emissions. Whether directly through vehicle emissions or through power plants needed to create electricity to pump water, its transport and treatment imposes a huge carbon load. That's a reason to conserve water even in areas where the stuff is plentiful and cheap.