Pacific Institute
pgleick | March 25, 2016As readers of this column may already know, earlier this week the Pacific Institute and I announced an important and exciting change: on July 1st after 28 years as co-founder and President of the Institute, I will be moving to a new position as President Emeritus and Chief Scientist. A wide search for a new president has been launched.
I’m neither resigning nor retiring. In my new role, I will continue to do research and writing on global climate, water, and sustainability issues, and I will continue to speak out on science and policy issues in public forums, with the press, and on social…
gregladen | February 26, 2016The latest episode of Ikonokast, the science podcast Mike Haubrich and I do, is now up. This is an interview with Pacific Institute's Peter Gleick. We talk about the California drought (past, present, and future), Syria, virtual water, El Nino and climate science denialism.
You can hear the podcast here: WHAT ABOUT WATER? DR. PETER GLEICK OF THE PACIFIC INSTITUTE.
pgleick | March 17, 2015California’s hottest and driest drought in recorded history has shifted the sources of electricity with adverse economic and environmental consequences. The Pacific Institute has just completed and released a report that evaluates how diminished river flows have resulted in less hydroelectricity, more expensive electricity from the combustion of natural gas, and increased production of greenhouse gas emissions.
The current severe drought has many negative consequences. One of them that receives little attention is how the drought has fundamentally changed the way our electricity is produced.…
pgleick | July 20, 2014In the past few weeks, I have had been asked the same question by reporters, friends, strangers, and even a colleague who posts regularly on this very ScienceBlogs site (the prolific and thoughtful Greg Laden): why, if the California drought is so bad, has the response been so tepid?
There is no single answer to this question (and of course, it presumes (1) that the drought is bad; and (2) the response has been tepid). In many ways, the response is as complicated as California’s water system itself, with widely and wildly diverse sources of water, uses of water, prices and water rights,…
pgleick | June 27, 2013For some time now, proponents of the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” have claimed there was little or no evidence of real risk to groundwater. But as the classic saying goes: “the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” of a problem. And the evidence that fracking can contaminate groundwater and drinking water wells is growing stronger with every new study.
As most people now know, fracking is a method for enhancing the production of natural gas (or oil, or geothermal energy wells). Fracking involves injecting fluids -- typically complex mixes of water and…
pgleick | March 13, 2013Here is the second in what will be a series of posts on how little things like changes in technology we take for granted, or simple behaviors, can have a big impact on water use. The first looked at turning off the water when you brush your teeth: a seemingly trivial thing. It turned out not to be so trivial. (I will, on occasion, also blog about the “not so little” things like fundamental changes in our agricultural systems, dietary choices, and industrial processes.)
The Pacific Institute has done extensive and groundbreaking research over the past 25 years on a wide range of water, climate…
pgleick | February 26, 2013One of the most important and threatening risks of climate change is sea-level rise (SLR). The mechanisms are well understood, and the direction of changes in sea-level is highly certain – it is rising and the rate of rise will accelerate. There remain plenty of uncertainties (i.e., a range of possible outcomes) about the timing and rate of rise that have to do with how fast we continue to put greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the responses of (especially) ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica, and the sensitivity of the climate.
Even little changes can have big consequences. As we saw…
pgleick | February 21, 2013The Pacific Institute has done extensive and groundbreaking research over the past 25 years on a wide range of water, climate, energy, and environmental issues. One focus has been on how to use water more efficiently to do the things we want to do – a focus on “efficiency” and “productivity” – not deprivation.
Society could certainly cut water use by removing urban lawns, or never washing our cars again, or eliminating irrigated alfalfa in the desert. But we've never recommended these things. Why? Not because the water savings from such changes are small: some of these things can produce vast…
pgleick | February 14, 2013Invest in the future. And especially, invest in sustainable, effective job creation in the water sector. The result will be millions of new jobs – a significant result.
That is the key message from a new analysis just released today by the Pacific Institute on sustainable water jobs in the United States. That study, Sustainable Water Jobs: A National Assessment of Water-Related Green Job Opportunities, finds that proactive investments increasing efficient water use, improving water quality, expanding smart water treatment and re-use, and more will address growing problems associated with…