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I found a fantastic quote that helps us understand the water problems, particularly pertinent for us here in California.
"We live in a world defined by 19th century water law, 20th century infrastructure and 21st century water needs." - Jennifer Pitt, Director, Colorado River Program, Environmental Defence Fund
So there are many things that we here in California and the rest of the world can do about the water crisis we are facing. However it is clear to me that the top 3 problems are:
1. Water Law
As quoted, the water laws that date back to the 1800s are not suitable for good stewardship of the resource. According to NPRDrought: 10 things to know about California water use | 89.3 KPCC the breakdown is agriculture with 62%, environmental @ 22% and urban at 16%.
No matter how you look at it, agriculture is the biggest user. This is always true and will probably always be true since food production needs water. However the laws that govern California law were designed to give farmers certainty in a bygone era.
So would you support a change in the water law? Most likely this would mean that we would have to sack the water rights, stripping them from the farmers and redesigning them. The state would have to exercise greater control of water.
Yay or Nay on water law change
2. Water Prices
Water Prices need to reflect the scarcity of water. This means higher prices. No matter how we do this, we cannot realistically get lasting reductions and investment into water unless the prices is higher than it is now. Water needs to take a page and learn from Renewable Energy that a higher prices causes companies and individuals to want to compete for innovation and cost reduction. This would encourage efficiency and hopefully spurn new techniques and water saving ideas. Also building infrastructure is incredibly expensive and the utility cannot be realistically expected to make such massive investments without the hope of recouping the costs. If places like here in CA & TX want to grow, they need these investments.
Would you support an increase in the price of water?
3. Water Regulations
The kind of regulations that I am talking about are the ones about water use. People need to be able to explore new options in the use and reuse of water with the compliance of the state. This means rainwater capture, greywater, desalination, purple pipe (wastewater reuse), and any other idea that we can come up with. Society will have to get more comfortable with trusting engineers & technology to meet their water needs. Practically this means that water will have to be treated and reused more often than it is today.
So are you up for the government making it easier to make it easier for water, such as wastewater, to be reused?
These are the 3 biggest reasons that I can see are holding water back. Most other issues do stem from these three. I want to gauge people's' opinions and see if we can move closer to a better system of management.
Some good points, some I agree with, some I do not agree with.
Unfortunately, nothing mentioned in the plan does anything to increase the overall water supply. Simply charging more for the same thing without any improvement is impoverishing and collectivist/command economy approach. It also uses the concept of forced scarcity to change behavior, but will only lead to economic damage to California
Water usage per capita has been dropping for the past 20 years, through market efforts. Urban/suburban use has dropped significantly, long before the current drought. The VAST bulk of water is used by agriculture, but to produce products that disproportionately provide profit, but are very inefficient use of water in the state. Just eliminating Almonds and Alfalfa alone could nearly double the available urban water availability (more than half both those crops are shipped to China BTW). The amount of GDP Almonds and Alfalfa contribute to the state GDP is minuscule to the amount of water they consume. It would literally be cheaper to buy up most of the Almond groves and plow them under in order to repurpose the water for use by the general population and would immediately increase the water supply
California climate has always been dry years with a few wet years in between, that's how the "average" is formed. Jerry Browns father invested in infrastructure to collect water during the wet years to provide supply during the dry years.
California has not invested in major water infrastructure since the first time Jerry "era of limits" Brown took over. The problem is he "limited" infrastructure, but couldn't limit population growth, so we have essentially the same infrastructure for when the population was half its current size.
Unfortunately Jerry wants it both ways, he wants less water use, but wants California to be a sanctuary state and invites millions of more people with scarcely the economic means to provide tax funding to improve water infrastructure. Yet he punishes and discourages business that would be able to provide the tax base to support all the impoverished people of the state. Contrary logic indeed.
Unfortunately Jerry wants it both ways, he wants less water use, but wants California to be a sanctuary state and invites millions of more people with scarcely the economic means to provide tax funding to improve water infrastructure. Yet he punishes and discourages business that would be able to provide the tax base to support all the impoverished people of the state. Contrary logic indeed.
Some good points, some I agree with, some I do not agree with.
Unfortunately, nothing mentioned in the plan does anything to increase the overall water supply. Simply charging more for the same thing without any improvement is impoverishing and collectivist/command economy approach. It also uses the concept of forced scarcity to change behavior, but will only lead to economic damage to California
Water usage per capita has been dropping for the past 20 years, through market efforts. Urban/suburban use has dropped significantly, long before the current drought. The VAST bulk of water is used by agriculture, but to produce products that disproportionately provide profit, but are very inefficient use of water in the state. Just eliminating Almonds and Alfalfa alone could nearly double the available urban water availability (more than half both those crops are shipped to China BTW). The amount of GDP Almonds and Alfalfa contribute to the state GDP is minuscule to the amount of water they consume. It would literally be cheaper to buy up most of the Almond groves and plow them under in order to repurpose the water for use by the general population and would immediately increase the water supply
California climate has always been dry years with a few wet years in between, that's how the "average" is formed. Jerry Browns father invested in infrastructure to collect water during the wet years to provide supply during the dry years.
California has not invested in major water infrastructure since the first time Jerry "era of limits" Brown took over. The problem is he "limited" infrastructure, but couldn't limit population growth, so we have essentially the same infrastructure for when the population was half its current size.
Unfortunately Jerry wants it both ways, he wants less water use, but wants California to be a sanctuary state and invites millions of more people with scarcely the economic means to provide tax funding to improve water infrastructure. Yet he punishes and discourages business that would be able to provide the tax base to support all the impoverished people of the state. Contrary logic indeed.
Water prices are the greater problem even before increasing water supply. Obviously we need to increase water supply. However there is no incentive to increase supply & become more efficient if water prices remain low. Just like gas prices, the high price pushed people away from SUVs and into hybrids, the same could happen for water. Not to mention, the undertaking of the billions of dollars of infrastructure costs to build new water networks/desalination etc. is prohibitive in a low price model.
So yes we need no water infrastructure, it's just more likely that it will follow higher prices.
We could follow the model we have right now, which is basically run out of water then find someone to blame. (Just blame immigrants) We can begin onerous rationing & the like, but that is the stupid way of solving it. Sadly we are being stupid.
We could follow the model we have right now, which is basically run out of water then find someone to blame. (Just blame immigrants) We can begin onerous rationing & the like, but that is the stupid way of solving it. Sadly we are being stupid.
Aren't immigrants people? Don't they use water? Don't we need more water supply and infrastructure to support them? Ergo, more immigrants mean more water use.
You are right, rationing doesn't work if you are increasing demand. Agriculture uses the vast majority of the water, a large portion of that for crops that provide minimal GDP and are exported to China.
Maybe we start reducing the production of crops that provide minuscule GDP but use more water than LA and SF combined.
Agriculture uses the vast majority of the water, a large portion of that for crops that provide minimal GDP and are exported to China.
Not true, 70% of California ag products are not exported and are consumed domestically. Two thirds of all fruits and nuts consumed in the US are grown here. And due to California's Mediterranean climate many of these crops cannot be grown elsewhere in the US.
One water-intensive industry that could be encouraged to leave the state to save water is cattle and dairy. California the #1 producer of milk and #2 in cheese. Cows use vast amounts of water and that industry can easily be relocated to other states where water is more plentiful. So I guess I'm saying we shouldn't ban all agriculture, just be smarter about which segments that should be encouraged or discouraged.
Aren't immigrants people? Don't they use water? Don't we need more water supply and infrastructure to support them? Ergo, more immigrants mean more water use.
You are right, rationing doesn't work if you are increasing demand. Agriculture uses the vast majority of the water, a large portion of that for crops that provide minimal GDP and are exported to China.
Maybe we start reducing the production of crops that provide minuscule GDP but use more water than LA and SF combined.
Blaming immigrants is an excuse for bad management. Notice that we don't have the similar problem when it comes to food or clothing. Why? Because those are handled in a market where prices can adjust allowing for supply and demand to equalize over time. No one ever says, "We are running out of clothes!" Or, "We are running out of food! We only have enough chicken to last another year!" If anyone actually notices, the only things that we are looking to run out of are the areas in which the government dominates and doesn't allow for change.
We don't need to reduce crop consumption, just increase the price on water. This does mean that all of the goods & services that are reliant on water will get more expensive (and therefore the market will ration it). However this will give better incentives to increase production of water which is where the real wealth of society stems from.
When people argue about reducing other things such as crop growth, or meat or anything I hope that they will understand that those are not the root of the problem. That would be akin to finding a coughing sick person. People decide that instead of treating the disease, simply having them tape their mouth shut. Sure they may not cough, but it does not alleviate the real problem. Blaming immigrants is simply trying to attack the cough rather than the disease.
If anyone actually notices, the only things that we are looking to run out of are the areas in which the government dominates and doesn't allow for change.
Government mission statement - Keep it complicated, no matter how simple. Tax it, regulate it.
Some good points, some I agree with, some I do not agree with.
Unfortunately, nothing mentioned in the plan does anything to increase the overall water supply. Simply charging more for the same thing without any improvement is impoverishing and collectivist/command economy approach. It also uses the concept of forced scarcity to change behavior, but will only lead to economic damage to California
Water usage per capita has been dropping for the past 20 years, through market efforts. Urban/suburban use has dropped significantly, long before the current drought. The VAST bulk of water is used by agriculture, but to produce products that disproportionately provide profit, but are very inefficient use of water in the state. Just eliminating Almonds and Alfalfa alone could nearly double the available urban water availability (more than half both those crops are shipped to China BTW). The amount of GDP Almonds and Alfalfa contribute to the state GDP is minuscule to the amount of water they consume. It would literally be cheaper to buy up most of the Almond groves and plow them under in order to repurpose the water for use by the general population and would immediately increase the water supply
California climate has always been dry years with a few wet years in between, that's how the "average" is formed. Jerry Browns father invested in infrastructure to collect water during the wet years to provide supply during the dry years.
California has not invested in major water infrastructure since the first time Jerry "era of limits" Brown took over. The problem is he "limited" infrastructure, but couldn't limit population growth, so we have essentially the same infrastructure for when the population was half its current size.
Unfortunately Jerry wants it both ways, he wants less water use, but wants California to be a sanctuary state and invites millions of more people with scarcely the economic means to provide tax funding to improve water infrastructure. Yet he punishes and discourages business that would be able to provide the tax base to support all the impoverished people of the state. Contrary logic indeed.
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