"California will run out of water in a year..........." (Los Angeles: new construction, live)

[saybanana]

We are not running out of water yet, we are just using it inefficiently and unsustainably. Most of the blame should go to farmers who indirectly export water intensive plants to other states and overseas like almonds, alfalfa, and many kinds fruit, veggies and nuts. If we didnt sell overseas, we would have enough water to support more than double the population from current 39 million to 80 million. People in suburbs and cities can do more but the amount is so very small overall.

[MordinSolus]

Originally Posted by JohnnyUtah1968

That's why I only drink and brush my teeth with bottled water when im in LA. LA tap water gives me diahrreah.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

What was the name of that Mad Max rip-off where people were fighting over water?

[saybanana]

Young Ones

[sownman]

Originally Posted by MordinSolus

It's really not that simple. The cost of desalination is much higher than the amount it takes to build the plants. There's the huge maintenance costs(they're hard to maintain because salt erodes pretty much everything), dealing with the super-salty slurry that's produced, and finding where to build the damn things without negatively impacting the local economy or environment. Then you have to realize that California's agriculture can't be sustained by snow and rainfall alone. Just about the entire California coastline will need to be lined with desalination plants every few miles.
Don't get me wrong, desalination needs to happen in a big way, buy you're simplifying it entirely too much.

So then we should go ahead and waste $68bil on a pointless train, which BTW takes money to operate also. No HS rail project has ever made a profit, they are all subsidized and this one won't ever be high speed for its entire length anyway. I'd choose water and aircraft every time.

Operation of desal plants is what the monthly water bills cover, and if the government has to subsidize anything from other sources of revenue would water be preferable to a train that can't even carry freight ?

[ASensiblePerson]

Brown orders California's first mandatory water restrictions: LA Times

Gov. Jerry Brown, standing on a patch of brown grass in the Sierra Nevada that is usually covered with several feet of snow at this time of year, on Wednesday announced the first mandatory water restrictions in California history. "It's a different world," he said. "We have to act differently."

Brown ordered the California Water Resources Control Board to implement mandatory restrictions to reduce water usage by 25%.

[znlwovuhrjw]

Don't forget, he also said it's time to rip out your lawns! I can't wait to see what happens by the end of May in water legislation!

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Originally Posted by kingdomkz

Don't forget, he also said it's time to rip out your lawns! I can't wait to see what happens by the end of May in water legislation!

He wants our yards as bald as his head.

[sownman]

I don't get why his action is happening so late, absolute nonsense. He's talking about cutting water usage by 25% which should have happened two years ago. He's talking about three day a week lawn watering rationing, but my neighborhood has been down to two days since last year and just announced a raise to three days. In the immortal words of Bugs Bunny "what a maroon !"

He's forging ahead on a completely idiotic train rather than building desalinization plants or even reservoirs. We have not added a reservoir in this state for 40 years and we let farm lands die for lack of water so the Delta Smelt (a minnow) can thrive.

[CALGUY]

Regardless of what the Gov thinks, or for that matter, anyone else, one day we will all have to wake up and realize that the ONLY way adequate water supply will be met in the entire Southwest, is to build a water pipe line from the snow capped mountains of Alaska, to the drought stricken southwest.
That is the ONLY way this water situation will cease to exist.

Water conservation itself is not going to solve the problem
Forget that stupid bullet train, and use the money, as well as federal grants to get started on construction of this pipe line.

What I find strange is, not one politician at the state or federal level has ever mentioned the idea of building such a pipe line.

Right after I saw the gov giving his speech on mandatory rationing, I got off an email to him.
Hope someone in Sacramento has the brains to forward that email to him so he can read it for himself.
Someone needs to remind him that we are in a water crisis, and better damm well do something about it.
Ain't gonna do much good to spend billions on a "super train", if there is no one there to ride it.
People will move out of the state if they can't get adequate water to quench their desert thirst.

It is just as simple as that.

Bob.