The Water Wars

 

Despite the Trump administration’s dismissal of the true cost of climate change, the President’s withdrawal from even the “too little, too late” Paris climate accord, climate change is already costing us life, health and trillions and trillions of dollars of losses. Oregon and California are burning up, dozens of deaths and millions of acres, hundreds if not thousands of structures gone. Fires almost impossible to contain. Thousands of firefighters doing their best. Air pollution as bad as it gets. And we know that this is hardly a one-time event.

Hurricanes sucking up overly warm waters from the Gulf, intensifying flooding and destruction for a thousand miles. Coastal erosion. Heat waves like we have never seen before. Insect migration carrying diseases where they shouldn’t be. And that’s just here.

Climate change also causes violence. War. Mass migration of those most impacted to regions that do not want them. ISIS would never have been able to take root but for never-ending drought in Sunni-held farms in Iraq and Syria. Shiite-controlled governments in Damascus and Baghdad were unwilling to come to the aid of Sunni farmers. ISIS stepped into that power vacuum. The farmers were, for the most part, horrified at that reality, but no one else came to their aid. Water wars!

The planet has at least double the number of people that it can comfortably support. We are losing land to drought, flooding, fire and erosion. When we clear land to accommodate more food production, we cut down the foliage we need to absorb carbon dioxide and generate oxygen. Global warming just gets worse. Nature is struggling to contain “too many people consuming too many resources” with her serial and roiling pandemics. And there is another ugly reality. The most valuable resource on earth just might not be oil; it is fresh water.

Looking at lakes, streams, rivers, aquifers and reservoirs, you might surmise that what really needs to happen is simply to move water from where it is to where it is needed… or perhaps simply to desalinate ocean water. A gallon of water weighs around 10 pounds. The problem is not just building pipelines or filling tankers and moving them by rail. All of this takes energy. Desalinization consumes an average of 10-13 kilowatt hours (kwh) per every thousand gallons. California has an elaborate system of aqueducts, pumping water uphill, using the downhill flow to generate electricity for pumping. But notwithstanding this seemingly efficient system, nearly 20% of the state's total electricity consumption goes toward water-related uses. And so much of our electrical power generation still relies on burning fossil fuel, which continues to exacerbate climate change.

“Solar and wind power use has grown at a rapid rate over the past decade or so, but as of 2018 those sources accounted for less than 4% of all the energy used in the U.S. (That’s the most recent full year for which data is available.) As far back as we have data, most of the energy used in the U.S. has come from coal, oil and natural gas. In 2018, those ‘fossil fuels’ fed about 80% of the nation’s energy demand, down slightly from 84% a decade earlier. Although coal use has declined in recent years, natural gas use has soared, while oil’s share of the nation’s energy tab has fluctuated between 35% and 40%.” Pew Research Center, January 15, 2020.

Think the water war violence is only “over there”? Think again. It’s right here, on our border with Mexico. “A long-simmering dispute about shared water rights between Mexico and the United States has erupted into open clashes pitting Mexican National Guard troops [pictured above] against farmers, ranchers and others who seized a dam in northern Chihuahua state… A 35-year-old mother of three was shot dead and her husband seriously wounded in what the Chihuahua state government labeled unprovoked National Guard gunfire.

“The demonstrators and state officials complain that the administration of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is diverting water to the United States at the expense of drought-stricken Mexican farmers and ranchers… ‘We will defend our water until the end,’ said Alejandro Aguilar, 57, a Chihuahua tomato and onion grower who was among the protesters. ‘We will not end our fight, because this liquid is vital to our future.’… La Boquilla dam remained in protesters’ custody as of Saturday [9/12]...

“The conflict has escalated into a national crisis in which both sides allege rampant corruption and the meddling of shadowy provocateurs and hidden political interests in a complex scenario reminiscent of ‘Chinatown,’ the iconic film about early 20th century water battles in Southern California.

“López Obrador denies any water shortage for farmers in Chihuahua and charges that his opponents are fomenting a politically motivated ‘rebellion.’ Mexico has been sending water north in advance of an October deadline to provide the United States with a vast amount of water owed under terms of a 76-year-old treaty… ‘We have to comply with the agreement,’ López Obrador told reporters, insisting that doing so will not result in any scarcity now or in the future. ‘We will not allow that Chihuahua be left without water.’

“Mexico is playing catch-up in its water debt to the United States after falling behind on last year’s installments. Meanwhile, Chihuahua growers say they are suffering the effects of an almost decadelong drought.” Patrick McDonnell for the Los Angeles Times, September 13^th. What we know is that climate change and water shortages are simply going to get much worse unless the entire planet takes some pretty dramatic steps that are nowhere on the horizon.

              I’m Peter Dekom, and governments all over the earth, particular here in the United States, seem only to react to these environmental disasters but are unwilling to be sufficiently proactive to solve this horrifically expanding problem.