Its Time To talk About Water...

jlew - we use water for a lot more than drinking....curtailing drinking water? no....other uses? there should be other options.
A perfect example is the fact that oil companies around here keep pumping MASSIVE amounts of fresh water into the ground to "float" the oil out…they are forcing it below the water table, taking it completely out of the cycle (less surface water = less rain, no?)….
They are also using heated water to separate bitumen from sand…which makes the water toxic…..then they let THIS 'water' sit in MASSIVE open air lakes (eery looking - steaming, man-made oily lakes with ZERO wildlife around them)….so the fresh stuff goes below the water table, the toxic stuff goes to the surface to seep back into it. Brilliant! If you ever need inspiration to become an environmentalist, visit the Alberta oilsands.
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Truthmonger wrote:

Its disappearing like crazy, yet we use it like there's no fucking tomorrow (at least here in N. America). I don't wanna get into a debate about whether its a natural phenomenon or a man-made dilemma. That's moot at this point. But i do wanna discuss why current water conservation efforts are so laughable.

Consider : When are we going to SERIOUSLY curtail our use of water ? When will govt's stop allowing explosive growth in areas that are already short on water - especially in the U.S.? Will it ever reach the point of municipalities rationing water to its citizens ? If citizens of a particular jurisdiction are irresponsible with this resource, is it fair for such people to then go knocking on the doors of other jurisdictions to ask for more ?

Every so often there will be a story in the local paper about some city out west wanting to make some sort of deal to siphon off Great Lakes water for their use. That idea is never well-received here. I mean, why didn't they use their heads to begin with? You build a big city in the middle of the desert (Las Vegas, Phoenix, wherever), dont you think you should have put a little thought into this water thing BEFORE you built the golf courses.? We've chosen to live near a major water source (as sensible people have been doing since the dawn of time). You want to live in a desert, that's your priviledge, but you go find your own water. You want ours, move back here .... our population is dropping, we could use you.

Water usage is a problem everywhere, very much so here in the good ol' US of A. The biggest culprit is that it is in most areas here it's still ridiculously cheap and therefore, most people don't give a flying fuck how much they use. It's a real problem all over the US, not just in the desert areas. Industry uses large amounts of water too, from manufacturing, oil production, paper mills, you name it. It all requires large amounts of water. Golf courses use millions of gallons a year. I'm talking individual courses. And most of the waste water from industry is unfit for human consumption without expensive treatment. I lived in the Seattle area and water was rationed for most of the one summer I was there. I currently live in Houston and my water rates have just doubled in the past few months. They've switched from groundwater to surface water (from lakes) because of the over usage of groundwater has caused major subsidence in many areas. This is a real problem. We all need and want water but still mostly take it for granted. There are so many ways to conserve that we're not really taking advantage of. Unfortunately we rarely act until our pocketbooks start taking a hit, so once everyone's water rates double we may see a shift towards more conservation, but probably not until then.

Drowned Out wrote:

sweet, help us lobby those greedy oil bastards, they don't want to develop new technology...it's cheaper and easier to just keep pumping millions of litres of water underground. They half emptied a lake near here doing this.


Seriously...didn't driftin say something about areas in the South being pretty much out of water? I keep hearing about Canada's fresh water being sold in back room deals and shipped south...and that Canada's greatest resource in the future will be water....it can't all be hype can it?

Yes, there are cities in Georgia, North Alabama and Tennessee that are only have a couple of weeks of water supply left. However, they are working with the Corps of Engineers and supposedly a plan is in place to divert water from some areas and give to those that need it more while putting a self imposed restriction on how much water people are using. Like asking people not to water their lawns or wash their cars.
It sounds like they have a plan for this but it would make for some good anarchy if cities were to run completely out of water.

hippiemom wrote:

Every so often there will be a story in the local paper about some city out west wanting to make some sort of deal to siphon off Great Lakes water for their use. That idea is never well-received here. I mean, why didn't they use their heads to begin with? You build a big city in the middle of the desert (Las Vegas, Phoenix, wherever), dont you think you should have put a little thought into this water thing BEFORE you built the golf courses.? We've chosen to live near a major water source (as sensible people have been doing since the dawn of time). You want to live in a desert, that's your priviledge, but you go find your own water. You want ours, move back here .... our population is dropping, we could use you.

This is a fair arguement when Cleveland and Detroit start supplying their own sources of fuel for heating through the winter months.

We should be smarter with water just like we should be smarter with every scarce resource.

On a side note, I thought that with global warming and the melting of the Artic that an inventive sort would find a way to capture that melting ice water for use. Solving the rise in the ocean table and providing potable water.

Drowned Out wrote:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,915637,00.html

you've got to think that this is a band-aid fix tho....it would HAVE to screw up the natural order in some way, wouldn't it?

If they're gonna melt anyways and in doing so cause havoc and death why not put 'em to good use.