Future shock - Epic drought could strike again, scientists warn

Sac Bee ^ | 12/22/02 | Stuart Leavenworth

[NormsRevenge]

Lake Tahoe sank so low before recent storms that many boat docks were left high and dry. Scientists say that historical droughts have caused Tahoe's vast shoreline to drop 20 feet, allowing forests to grow where there is now water.

[NormsRevenge]

Liquid A$$ets

[NormsRevenge]

"The picture doesn't look good," said Steve Hall, executive director of the California Association of Water Agencies.

"Since the last drought, we've added 6 million people. We have not added significant new supplies. During that time, we have reallocated
somewhere between 1 million and 2 million acre-feet of water to the environment. That is good for the environment, but it makes less water
available to the rest of the system."

Not only is the state growing, said Hall, but families are moving into the drier, hotter portions of the state's inland valleys, buying large-lot homes
that require more water for landscaping. Partly for that reason, per capita water use in California has risen to 200 gallons daily, up from 160 gallons
during 1992, the final year of the last drought.

"The fact is, we don't use water very efficiently in California," said Peter Gleick, president of an Oakland-based think-tank, the Pacific Institute. "It
is only during droughts that people start to pay attention to the proper use of water."

[Amerigomag]

The senerios presented are so logical that you'd think government would listen.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to deduce that droughts are possible. It doesn't even take much more intelligence to concluded that a western (geomorphologically and climatologically speaking) desert is not an ideal place to house a large population.

Yet both or natinal policy and state policies absolutely abhor population control. Population control appears to run absolutely contrary to our national purpose of freedom.

Well I have news for the libertaring lurking in us all. Sooner rather than later, the immutable laws of nature are going to catch up with our predispostion for personal freedom.

I suspect our solution will be that we all equally share a miserable existance where politcal rivalries over resources and exhortations calling for sacrafices to a greater good are the soup of the day.

I am approaching senior citizenship and I expect to see this in my lifetime.

[lewislynn]

Water problems and California are synonymous.

There always have been and always will be water wars/problems real or otherwise in California.

One proposal is to expand pumping plants near Tracy, so more water could be sent south into storage during periods when fish aren't around....?

I remember going to Southern Calif. during the 87-92 drought and seeing the lake on the grapevine (supplied by the California Aquaduct from Tracy south) full to the brim and people washing their cars without nozzles on thier hoses letting the water run down the driveway into the gutters......

BTW, Lake Tahoe has one spillway and that spillway is never altered, the water flows (east) down the Truckee River right through downtown Reno. I don't know that anyone in California uses one drop of water from Lake Tahoe.

[Rodney King]

Yet both or natinal policy and state policies absolutely abhor population control. Population control appears to run absolutely contrary to our national purpose of freedom.

I abhor it as well. What do you want, forced abortions like in China? The population control people are all nutty facists who only see a static world. That is, they only see current resources - and future population size. They can't imagine that resources increase as human ingenuity is put to the test. In the 1970's, your fellow travellers were all saying that we'd all be dead now unless we had population control. Now you seem to think it will happen in your lifetime. Guess what? Unless the governments all turn socialist, it won't. There has never been famine in a free country, and there never will be.

That's not to say there won't be a problem at Tahoe. They'pre probably will be. But making the prediction that someday there will be another drought is like predicting that sometime when you roll dice you will get snake eyes.

[Nick Danger]

I am approaching senior citizenship and I expect to see this in my lifetime.

So did Malthus, and he's been dead for 170 years.

People are not trees. They can move. If it gets dry over here, they'll go over there. This has been going on for thousands of years. It's really no big deal.

This is just another one of those stupid articles about how Something Bad Is Coming. Who knows why they write these things. A twenty year long drought will take twenty years to happen. There will be plenty of time for people to move to Minnesota, drink their 10,000 lakes, and elect Hulk Hogan the new Governor.

[Rodney King]

Plus, the world is not over-populated. The entire world could have a 1200 sqaure foot home in Texas, assuming 4 people per family. The problem is countries where people starve is not freedom, but the lack of it. When people can't plant food without it being stolen by either their neghbors or the government, they don't plant it.

[freeforall]

not to worry Arctic ice cap to vanish in 80 years!

[William Tell]

Amerigomag said: "Well I have news for the [libertarian] lurking in us all. Sooner rather than later, the immutable laws of nature are going to catch up with our predispostion for personal freedom."

Thank goodness Kalifornia hasn't made the same mistake with electricity. Thanks to central planning by the liberals, we have a surplus of generating capacity and all the electricity that even low-income citizens could ever want.

NOT !!!

( And please spare me the claim that it was "deregulation" that created the electricity problems. When the utilities should have raised prices to lower consumption, they were not allowed to.)

[ckilmer]

the cost of desalinised water has dropped by a third over the last three years. If it continues to do that over the next decade then the cost of desalinised water ten years from now will be about what the cost of fresh water is in northeastern US.

how likely is that? Reverse Osmosis is the process by which most water is desalinised. By this process water moves through various semi permiable membranes to filter out organisms impurities and salt. the field of materials research which makes the filters is pretty much as dynamic as the field that makes ever smaller computer chips. However, it is less glamourous.

Its pretty likely that costs of water desalinisation will come down fast if only because of the amount of desalinised water that is coming online over the next 10 years. Everyone all over the world is facing the same kinds of water shortages that california is facing to a greater or lesser degree.

So economies of scale will be realized. And more players will come to the table to invent better membranes and rationalize the process.

As the price comes down more and more uses will be found for desalinised water until finally its used for agriculture and places like the deserts of the middle east north africa and Mexico will be turned green.

A green mexico would give fewer incentives to mexicans to come north.and would create the foundations for a rich country there.

I like the problems that California has. They provide a roadmap for the future.

[afz400]

Well then, why don't YOU invite everyone in the world to move to YOUR town right now? I'm sure their "ingenuity" will save the day for you, right and you will all live in peaceful bliss.

[Amerigomag]

What do you want, forced abortions like in China?

Not exactly. Here's three quickies off the top of my head to achieve controlled growth.

My first suggestion would be a policy already practiced in some California counties. Specifically, a sensible limitation on building permits.

Another step would be a policy already in place with regard to large commercial customers in most areas of California. Specifically, limiting new enegry hookups until the infrastructure is in place to handle the load.

Third would be a realistic approach to energy sales in a saturated market. Let the customer pay for the comodity in a free market. As power becomes scarce it becomes expensive. Gentrification becomes the motivation for the populalation shift you predict.

[Amerigomag]

People are not trees. They can move

Exactly.

But what gets them to move before the crisis erupts. Sensible growth regulation.

[irv]

experts say the state should be wary of a "perfect storm," in which water cutbacks combine with natural drought and global warming

"Experts" don't count global warming as a factor. This article is pure FUD.

[Nick Danger]

But what gets them to move before the crisis erupts. Sensible growth regulation.

What's this, Smart People Wearing Suits herding the masses around like cattle? What are you doing on a conservative forum? That is an "unconstrained vision" assumption... the vision of the anointed leading the hapless drones to a better future by being benevolent... and condescending. You can't get to conservatism from there. That vision is the foundation of liberal mommy-state-ism.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

Something else you can't do anything about to worry to death. As long as these storms keep coming in from the north pacific and snow falls in the Sierra, there is no problem. When it stops doing this for a few years, head 'em up and move 'em out. Gosh, so much to do about what maybe, or may not be, or could be or ...........get a grip guys.

[Rodney King]

Well then, why don't YOU invite everyone in the world to move to YOUR town right now? I'm sure their "ingenuity" will save the day for you, right and you will all live in peaceful bliss.

I never said that there are not certain areas where there is overpopulation. Besides, in my town, OKC, people are free to move in and out and do with their land as they please.

[TYVets]

I bet some good old fashioned Capitalism would work in California.

[Paulus Invictus]

Send the 5-6 million illegals back to Mexico and the water situation should inprove, along with the economy, the school and hospital systems etc. Hey, it's just a suggestion!