The Water Wars

Jobs, energy, education… the United States, for that matter, the world, seems to be a story of the misery imposed on the exploding population of humanity from shortages. Is nature trying to eliminate “nature’s senior predator” with war, plague, pestilence and famine? Do those four horsemen ride with God’s mandate? The big shortage I’ve blogged about in Kenya – the drought-plagued African Rift Valley – WATER… is very much a part of the American landscape as well. An excerpt from a book I published last year on Kindle:

As urban growth in desert landscapes continues, looking at cities like Las Vegas (flying over Lake Mead shows you just how far the water table has fallen) and Los Angeles, and as aquifers in places like Montana and Idaho are rapidly being drained, the 21^st century may well be remembered as the time when we ran out of water. The April 4, 2007 New York Times noted that while the western states are struggling with a drought that began in 1999 combined with the impact of global warming and population growth, even with $2.5 billion in new water projects, water wars loom as battle lines are being drawn. The Ogallala Aquifer (which runs beneath eight states, between the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi River, and provides water for the grain-producing states) was once the size of Lake Huron, but at a net consumption of five feet of water per year, some time in the next two or three decades, that water will be gone, and those [mid-west] states face the possibility of turning into a vast and infertile dust bowl.

As rain water runoff pours down the “Los Angeles River” – a drainage ditch with a fancy name – on those rare occasions that it “rains in Southern California,” I am reminded of the water wars waged with the Northern California Owens Valley so many years ago (rent the move Chinatown if you want to see a dramatic rendition – great film), the agreement among the Western states (made at Bishops Lodge outside of Santa Fe New Mexico in 1922) to divvy up the waters of the Colorado River and the trickle of water than remains to flow into Mexico after American thirst and water waste has had its fill. I read scary articles about the radiation leak in north central New Mexico (from Los Alamos) into the aquifers that slake so many of the homes around Santa Fe. California’s Imperial Valley grows desperately-needed food with scare water diverted into this desert region (never really suited for farming) from everywhere but the Imperial Valley.

As massive dams built to store water and generate electricity slow from the inevitable build-up of silt, the future of water… and hence the United States… is increasingly on the line. Just about everything man builds – sooner or later – wears out. California, a state where even San Francisco is really a desert, is a place where water issues are always at the top of the political agenda. Water restrictions are common, but while eastern states have too much water, the western region is a desiccated mess. And the tales of desalinization seldom take into consideration the considerable energy needs and massive costs of such a long-term infrastructure project.

On an ePage featuring an ad of “Endless Pools,” the November 5^th Los Angeles Times wrote of what California is proposing for its less-than-moist future: “Lawmakers capped months of discussions, weeks of tedious negotiations and years of chasing a water deal with approval of major legislation in a marathon session that ended [November 4^th] as the sun rose… The package, which includes an $11.1-billion bond that must go before voters, would nudge California in new directions on water policy while giving something to each of the major factions that have warred over the state's supplies… The measure, likely to reach the governor's desk [in the week of November 9^th], would establish a statewide program that for the first time would measure if too much water is being pumped from underground aquifers. It mandates an overall 20% drop in the state's per capita water use by 2020 and creates a new, politically appointed council to oversee management of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, the state's water hub…”

“The bond has to be approved by voters, a gamble in a time of gaping budget deficits and job losses. The big infrastructure projects it would fund are probably years away from construction. Mending the crippled delta is far from a sure thing… The package's broad scope is in part a recognition that the good old days are gone, and that the state must embrace new approaches to meet its water needs… ‘This is California slowly and painfully coming to terms with a static water supply,’ said Phil Isenberg, a former legislator who has grappled with water issues for years. ‘There are big problems and [we] have to do a bunch of different things.’”

Nature probably doesn’t care if the legislation passes or not and probably is agnostic to whether human beings actually take any steps at all to moderate water usage. She probably doesn’t even care if the cause is climate change or wasteful consumption practices; when there isn’t enough, the water just runs out. If communities die and people cannot sustain life without the precious droplets, so what if they make for some future archaeologist’s PhD thesis study of ancient man’s abandoned civilizations?

I’m Peter Dekom, and I approve this message.