
Water crisis coming in 15 years unless the world acts now, UN report warns - jayfuerstenberg
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/water-crisis-coming-in-15-years-unless-the-world-acts-now-un-urges/article23551722/
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phkahler
They point to population growth as a contributing factor, yet they never
suggest anyone do anything about that.

How about free birth control to anyone who wants it? How about permanent birth
control to any adult who wants it? I'd say free to anyone below some income
level since the middle class can afford it anyway. With increasing
productivity we don't have jobs for all the people anyway, why not encourage
making less of them?

I'm not talking about mandates or government deciding who reproduces, just
having them help folks that would prefer not to have kids to not have them.
The solution doesn't always have to be more regulation.

~~~
josefresco
I think one of the keys to "controlling" population growth is to bring people
out of poverty. Most studies I read, show dropping birth rates as
people/nations climb the economic ladder. Education, and health care also play
a big part.

~~~
throwaway5752
Since the original topic is the global fresh water crisis, wouldn't the
increased per capita resource consumption from greater standards of living
offset any gains in population growth slowing?

~~~
DanBC
Hopefully the developing world can learn from our mistakes and not build
cities and farmland in deserts.

~~~
throwaway5752
I will offer a brief and unenthusiastic defense of that practice... the
desert/arid climate can result in great yields as a result sunlight, lower use
of pesticides and fungicides (dry climate unfriendly to mold and insects), and
be less disruptive to - subjectively, on my part - less important ecosystems.

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FilterJoe
With all the talk of water running out in CA and the world, I am wondering why
desalination is not part of the conversation. According to Wikipedia:

"Supplying all domestic water by sea water desalination would increase the
United States' energy consumption by around 10%, about the amount of energy
used by domestic refrigerators."

Is this true? If so, why isn't desalination happening on a massive scale in
CA?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desalination#Considerations_and...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desalination#Considerations_and_criticism)

EDIT: The Wikipedia sentence I quoted was not clearly written. It should have
said "supplying all household water" not "supplying all domestic water." Far
more water is used by farming.

~~~
tehchromic
Simple: cost

As long as it is cheaper to exploit an existing clean water source than to
spend the energy, and invest in the massive and in some cases unproven tech
and engineering infrastructure to build desalination plants, then that's what
will happen.

It's unfortunate, because the cost to future generations, or the biosphere
doesn't calculate into our current economic system, and most of the commercial
infrastructure is aligned against re-calibration of that kind, because it
would cost them dearly.

~~~
cpncrunch
[http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/534996/megasca...](http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/534996/megascale-
desalination/)

$0.58/m3 seems pretty cheap to me.

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Lethe101
Something that bears mentioning when you read this type of report:

If something is 10-20 years in the future in these types of models, this has:

a) Already happened unless b) there are major changes / interactions that
scientific models have not had factored in while c) Anthropic actions cannot
change this, but it can change x+n where X is original time and n is the 'down
ramp' from your curve.

For instance: if your Co2 is 400ppm now, then the effects have already
happened 20-50 years into the future. It can be made much much worse through
events before you hit that time (let us say either Yellowstone or the entire
of India / China buying a car per family) but your actions in the interim are
merely altering the effects after time X.

In the case of water we can say: model presents X+n time > if action: such as
massive investment in desalination and/or new osmosis materials (positive to
time change) minus climate impacts we've not noticed yet (negatives to time
change) where n is less than continued effect without any other imputs.

This is a rather loopy way to say:

People think of these types of announcements as future based predictions:
they're not, they're present events if (and only if) your models don't change.

[Note: this isn't to say they're scientifically incorrect - but this inability
to understand time in these types of reports fuels a lot of ignorance from
both "sides" of Climate / Ecological debates]

~~~
pdkl95
> models don't change

I wonder if the software running those models has finally been corrected[1] to
use floating point properly. Giving different results from the same
data+software when run on different hardware suggests rounding wasn't being
handled properly[2].

As these models are already so sensitive to initial conditions that "ensemble
prediction" are necessary to avoid chaotic results, mishandling floating point
rounding could completely destroy the results.

[1]
[http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19957-01/806-3568/ncg_goldberg.ht...](http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19957-01/806-3568/ncg_goldberg.html)

[2] [http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/07/28/137209/same-
progr...](http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/07/28/137209/same-programs--
different-computers--different-weather-forecasts)

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rootedbox
Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a
painted ship Upon a painted ocean.

Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every
where, Nor any drop to drink.

~~~
systemtheory
so, what i hear you saying is, you're proposing we double down on
desalinization?

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mercnet
Possible water crisis in the future, and governments are selling water
supplies for $2.25 per million litres!
[http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/03/06/outrage-boils-
over-a...](http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/03/06/outrage-boils-over-as-b-c-
government-plans-to-sell-groundwater-for-2-25-per-million-litres/)

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joeclark77
I bet they've got their finger right on a set of great solutions: (1) more
money for the UN, (2) more sovereign power handed over to the UN, (3) more
money _from_ the UN to fund more studies on why more money should be given to
the UN, (4) more posh conferences for UN and UN-related bigshots in exotic
locales, (5) annihilate Israel, (6) new Nobel prizes to be handed out to UN-
grant-funded researchers promoting increased funding of the UN at UN-sponsored
conferences...

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nobleach
With the rising sea levels (due to global warming), wouldn't now be the best
time to figure out how to pipe that desalinated water all over the continents?

~~~
webXL
I don't think we'll be able to desalinate all that water, but figuring out an
affordable pumping solution to combat sea level rise would be worthwhile,
nonetheless. It's a "pipe dream" (sorry) at this point, but who knows what
kind of energy technologies might make this doable someday. And if we have the
affordable energy to achieve that, then I think we'll have a lot of options.
Not buying Florida beach-front property any time soon though.

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youngtaff
If our weather is getting more unpredictable due to climate change why don't
we get better at capturing the heavy rain we experience in some parts of the
world and allowing it to sink in to the ground rather than running off into
rivers.

Particularly thinking of some of the flooding in UK and Europe over the last
decade.

If the ice caps melt due to rising temperature surely this means more water in
the atmosphere and more rain in some places?

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
This might work in the UK. There is no national water infrastructure, so
although it rains a lot, there are regular droughts - especially in the South
East where most of the population lives.

There's been some noise about fixing this, but after privatisation there's no
commercial interest in taking on national-scale projects without government
subsidy.

Somewhere like CA is largely desert anyway, and there's no obvious wet climate
area to collect water from.

So practically, only draconian conservation laws and perhaps a huge string of
desal plants can save CA. I guess neither of those are likely. And then you
get a repeat of what's happening in Sao Paulo and Rio in Brazil, where there's
no water for days on end.

The terrifying thing about climate change is that it's literally making some
areas uninhabitable. Large parts of FL have less than fifty years, CA and NM
are drying out, the East Coast will become more prone to flooding and perhaps
also to extreme winters.

Europe is going to have similar problems as flooding becomes common. There are
already places in the UK where buildings insurance is no longer affordable.

At some point the economics stop making sense. Not long after that people
either leave or become homeless.

It would have been smart to avoid these outcomes, but that doesn't seem to
have happened.

~~~
youngtaff
When ever I go to the US I'm surprised at how water inefficient many places
are - hotels with square flat basins that need a huge amount to water to fill
to a usable level, to toilets that just seem to flush gallons down the drain.

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webXL
This is a non issue, provided that economic growth continues. That 10% of
energy costs which desalination would add, we just choose to spend it on
things not as vital. With economic growth, we just spend more and more of the
new wealth on building desal infrastructure. If we're able to add nuclear to
the mix, it lowers our total energy cost freeing up some additional room for
desal. Fusion will definitely make this a non issue.

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mark_l_watson
As more of the world becomes middle class, there is more demand for meat
protein. This is a problem since it takes about 10 times the water (and also
energy) to support non-vegetarian diets.

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niche
Introducing Aquabob! Imagine: a dome that collects condensation (think morning
dew). It waters your greenhouse, and leaves you with plenty to water down for
those midnight cocktails

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guyzero
Once again, Silicon Valley is way ahead of the curve.

~~~
tomjen3
Guess who will be called in to help them get more water, somehow?

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evo_9
Whew, thank god. Cause the Peak Oil guys sure need something new to fret
about.

And these things always come true exactly as predicted because, you know,
progress doesn't continue along, Moore's Law doesn't continue along.

~~~
delecti
Progress would be the world acting.

