What To Remember About Water
Before The Well Runs Dry
By J. Dietrich Stroeh

“Whiskey’s for drinking, water’s for fighting about.” – Mark Twain

- A simple rule governs all commodities. The law of supply and demand says that the less there is of any commodity, and the more demand there is for it, the higher its price will be. If that commodity is essential to maintaining life, in times of scarcity people will pay any price for it and do whatever necessary to obtain it. That’s how wars start.

- The most essential component of life is water. People can do without food but we cannot live long without water. Oil may make the world go round, but we can survive without it. Water – fresh, clean drinking water – is about to become a very hot commodity in the world. Water is then new oil.

- There is a subconscious assumption that the amount of water in the world is infinite. We all know about the water cycle. Rain falls from the sky, it flows into the seas and rises through evaporation into clouds, and the cycle repeats itself endlessly. At the same time there is another assumption that the amount of water in the world is adequate to meet the needs of the world’s population. Historically, as the world’s population has grown, the challenge has been to move fresh water to the people, usually in the form of reservoirs and canals. But when you start guarding, measuring and selling it, God’s gift to mankind suddenly becomes a commodity.

- Since the Industrial Revolution, much of the world’s fresh water supply has become polluted. Our aging water infrastructure is also springing leaks. The world’s underground aquifers are being drained and it will take thousands of years to replenish them. Population growth in America has meant poor people moving to desert communities in search of cheap land and rapidly emptying aquifers. Fancy desert resorts and retirement communities are springing up in the deserts, where golf courses and swimming pools suck back fresh water like sponges.

- Ninety-nine percent of the world’s water is found in the oceans, but it contains salt and is not drinkable. Most of the world’s fresh water is preserved in a frozen form, either in glaciers or in the polar ice caps. Many of the glaciers in the world are rapidly melting due to climate change. That fresh water eventually ends up in the ocean, mixing with salt. The snows that replenish these frozen reservoirs are now often falling as rain instead, leading to early runoff from reservoirs. All water that runs off to the sea is wasted for drinking and irrigation purposes.

- Several glacier-fed rivers have dried up completely in recent droughts, eliminating drinking supplies to cities. In such circumstances, unforeseen consequences can ensure; nuclear reactors are shut down because there is no water available for cooling. Cities dependant on nuclear power can experience blackouts and the ensuring economic consequences.

- Some cities located next to coastlines have been able to construct desalination plants to purify salt water, but only if they have direct access to abundant sources of cheap energy. All power plants burning fossil fuel emit vast quantities of carbon dioxide, accelerating climate change. Those looking to modern technology for energy solutions may not be aware that the technology itself is causing the problem in the first place.

- Most of the world’s dams and reservoirs that can be built have already been built. In California, for instance, every inch of Sierra Nevada snowmelt is already being stockpiled, while most of the state’s underground aquifers are being sucked dry. Meanwhile, California’s population has greatly increased along with the rest of the world’s. In California, estimates are that the population could rise to as many as 48 million people as soon as 2020. While there may be efficiencies in irrigation, no more fresh water will be created for these millions of new residents.

- Water wars are stating to erupt around the world. For example, in California, farmers, fishers and environmentalists are already skirmishing over access to the same rivers. Don’t forget the natives and the emerging outdoors and recreational industries either. River rafters, hikers, birders and anglers like their water too. In fact, there may be less. Urban communities are starting to fight the agricultural interests in court over fresh water and will soon be competing against other urban communities for the same supply. The political ramifications are overwhelming and the economic results will be far-reaching. Already, huge agricultural interests have defeated activists trying to save the environment, but in turn those agricultural interests have lost major court battles to metropolitan districts that possess far greater political power.

- The price of this most precious commodity will rise in direct proportion to increasing demand and declining supply. To chart the changes and predict the future, let’s draw current water consumption, and its rising cost, as a line shooting upward on a steeply acceleration curve. Draw the expected population increase as another line, shooting upward as well, but on a conflicting path. It is theoretically possible to estimate a time when the two lines will intersect. It’s less easy to predict what repercussions will result when that collision occurs, but it certainly won’t be harmonious.

Again, using California as an example: Since the population in California could reach 48 million by the year 2020, and given that the state’s finite water supply will have increased in price by a relative amount during the same time frame, and given that many powerful interests involved will be fighting over the same supply, we have a formula for disaster.

Let’s call this formula “the 20/20 factor.” Using this phrase allows us to quantify a focal point and see when the ever-growing state of California will finally run out of water. Imagining the world’s sixth-largest economy without sufficient water for all its needs is a difficult thing to do. Yet history teaches us that the catastrophic weather-related events have ravaged California in the past. Carbon dating of ancient tree rings clearly indicates that California experienced several killer droughts long before the arrival of European settlers. than the usual precipitation occurs, or when less rain falls than is needed to support the population. Extended droughts, some up to 200 years in duration, have not been uncommon in California’s pre-settled history, but that’s not public knowledge, yet. Currently the entire state’s water supply stored in lakes and reservoirs and moved by pipelines and aqueducts, can only serve a thirsty public’s demand for water for a period of 2 to 3 years. After that, the well runs dry.

Modern research also shows that the 1850’s to 1880’s, when we first started keeping weather records in California, were some of the wettest years in the state during the last several millennia. The data that we have been using as a yardstick for over a century may prove useless for the future precipitation projections.

- How will mankind survive with less available water, given the increase in the world’s population and the resulting competition for water? The answer many not lie only with technology, such as desalination plans. There must be a paradigm shift in society’s thinking from the current belief that “I’ve got mine; it’s your problem” to an understanding that all available water must be shared and controlled by a single entity responsible to everyone. No one can live without water.

- The lesson of the Great California Drought of 1976-77 is not that there is a huge need for somebody in chare of each state’s water supply, coordinating all water agencies and private companies. Under the present at-large system, no agency has any incentive to work with any other agency. In fact, most municipalities will fight each other rather than work toward a solution.

- When water runs short, it is also important to learn which public policies are effective, and which are resisted. Generally speaking, forced rationing is not popular, but an “allotment’ program in which each person or household is allowed a certain amount – and must decide what to do with it – is accepted more readily by the public.

- As water supplies become stretched, it will be necessary for all those involved in the issue of water – water districts, environmentalists, farmers, industry, fisheries, government, lumber companies, recreational interests and the general public – to develop a comprehensive plan for water supply survival. A “water master” may be necessary to coordinate all these different parties and make binding decisions according to well-defined guidelines.

Existing water supply systems must be integrated to achieve the most efficient and intelligent approach, balancing the available water supplies with the needs of a growing population.

The efficient use of water may require some of the following policies: adopting stricter conservation guidelines; more wastewater reclamation, better watershed efficiency, inter-basin watershed transfers, more efficient farming methods, elimination of water-intensive, low profit crops, a return to landscaping that promotes native trees and plants, and new sources of water such as desalination. As supplies dwindle and the population increases, water will become dirtier and more difficult to treat; therefore it will be more expensive.

- We must all work together to assure or future water needs are met. Droughts will come and go, but certainly the population will increase. With many more people and any extended drought, we will have an environmental disaster. It is an eventuality for which we must be prepared.