Draining the Blue Planet: A Special Feature on Water Scarcity
by Dave Tilford
We live in a world of water. It covers most of the planet's surface. We ourselves are made of it — roughly 60 percent of the human body (and 70 percent of our brains) is water. From sustenance to transportation to industry, water flows through almost everything we do.
So it's more than a little alarming when scientists and policy makers tell us that fresh, clean water is getting harder and harder to come by. Water scarcity is shaping up as a colossal social and environmental crisis for the coming decades. Currently, nearly 20 percent of the global population — well over a billion people — lack access to clean drinking water. The United Nations predicts a 40 percent increase in global water use over the next two decades. By 2025, two thirds of the global population is expected to be living in water-stressed conditions.
In the words of World Bank vice-president Ismail Serageidin, "If the wars of [the 20th] century were fought over oil, the wars of the next century will be fought over water." Indeed, the late King Hussein of Jordan once cited water — not oil or religion — as the only spark that could ignite a war with Israel, given Israel's geographic ability to close the spigot on Jordan's water supply.
What we have, what we use
Earth has just as much water as it did eons ago, but most of the stuff that makes this planet blue comes laced with oceanic salt, unfit for human consumption (and desalinization is very, very expensive). Only 2.5 percent of the water supply is fresh, and over two-thirds of that is frozen away in polar ice caps and permanent snow cover. Most of what remains exists as soil moisture, or is buried in terrestrial depths too costly and difficult to plumb. All told, a mere one-hundredth of one percent of the world's water is readily available for human use.
Over the past century, people have gone to great lengths to funnel that remaining fraction of a percent to our benefit. Redirecting water is nothing new, but the level of alteration and appropriation that occurred during the 20th century dwarfed all prior efforts. Global water use increased sixfold during that time, more than double the rate of population growth. Canals were dug, reservoirs built and 40,000 large dams sprung up to support booming agriculture and industry and provide hydropower. In the process, we fundamentally changed the world's hydrological cycles. We moved so much water around we even subtly changed the orbit of our planet.
Humans annually appropriate over half the accessible runoff and one-fourth of the earth's total fresh water in natural circulation. Agriculture accounts for roughly three-quarters of water consumption worldwide, mostly for irrigation. Industry claims about 20 percent, roughly two-thirds of which goes to hydro- and nuclear power generation, with the remainder going mostly to manufacturing processes. Domestic use accounts for the final 5 percent.
Here at home
In the United States, factoring in agricultural and industrial use, we withdraw about 1,300 gallons of fresh water per person per day — substantially more than twice the world average. (Only a handful of small Central Asian countries, led by Turkmenistan, have higher per capita withdrawal rates than the United States.) The good news is that stepped-up efficiency efforts have resulted in a decline in total water withdrawals in the United States since a 1980 peak, even as the population has risen. Municipalities, industries and farmers are cutting waste and employing water-saving technologies to do much more with less.
Despite this promising decline and despite the fact that the United States is comparatively water-rich, many parts of the country still face water scarcity. Seven Western states and Mexico bleed the Colorado River so dry these days that it rarely reaches the ocean. In California, water battles are the stuff of legend as megacities fight megafarms for water and Los Angeles' pipeline roots extend to rivers and lakes hundreds of miles away. In the Midwest, the water level in the massive underground Ogallala Aquifer, which stretches from South Dakota to Texas and irrigates much of the Great Plains croplands, has been dropping alarmingly. By 2020, the Ogallala may lose almost two-thirds of its 1974 volume, according to computer projections by the Texas Water Development Board. Many of our lakes, rivers and wetlands have been severely compromised ecologically by damming, drainage and pollution. Some 37 percent of freshwater fish species and 40 percent of freshwater amphibians in the United States are threatened or have become extinct.
Drawing deeper
What's to be done about our burgeoning water needs? One answer is simply to get at more of what is there — to capture an even greater percentage of the available supply. Plans are already underway for a global water trading system that will move water from heretofore untapped sources to places where demand is high. Fresh water will begin flowing over the ocean. Thirsty users in the American Southwest, long covetous of Canada's aqueous wealth, may divert the flow to this side of the border. In some cases, the muscle of NAFTA and other trade agreements have been invoked in an attempt to override local opposition to such schemes.
Other appropriation efforts involve dubious claims of ownership. Famed corporate raider T. Boone Pickens plans to sell 200,000 acre-feet of groundwater out from under his Texas ranch — which incidentally sits atop the Ogallala Aquifer — to water-strapped municipalities near and far. Pickens' claim to the water is tied to an antiquated Texas law allowing landowners to capture and sell any and all water found directly under their properties — even if that water comes from a shared source and even if doing so poses an undue threat to the shared supply.
Pickens' water grab may seem brazen, but it is small compared to efforts underway to more formally "privatize" the global water supply. Throughout the world, a small handful of monolithic water companies are taking over management, operation and sometimes even ownership of public water systems. The hope is that private industry, motivated by profit, will have the incentive to make the delivery system more efficient. The fear is that these companies will not be held accountable to local people who depend on the water, nor to ecosystems that represent more than just a volume of water for the taking. Without safeguards, a basic human right could easily turn into just another commodity to be sold to the highest bidder. Resistance to these privatization efforts is growing, both in the United States and abroad.
Efficiency of use
The trouble with much of these schemes to globalize and privatize water is that they place far too much emphasis on efficiency of delivery and not enough emphasis on efficiency of use. In the coming years, given population projections, we will be hard pressed not to draw a great deal more of the fresh water supply available to us. But in the absence of serious conservation efforts, the social and environmental impacts will be far greater. Already overtaxed systems may fail altogether.
A more sustainable path is to use what we have more wisely. Many farmers in the United States and around the world are adopting drip irrigation methods that drastically reduce water use without affecting yield. Unfortunately, in parts of the United States the incentive to adopt available technologies is dampened by
lavish federal subsidies for agricultural water — making it less painful to waste water and grow less water-efficient food.
Not all the ways in which we could change our behavior to conserve water involve directly conserving water. Urban sprawl paves over land and impairs its natural ability to recharge aquifers and surface waters. Smart growth policies that preserve open space would curtail polluted runoff and allow clean water to seep into the soil, replenishing groundwater.
Profligate energy use is a factor, too. The Piedmont Environmental Council estimates that 83 percent of all groundwater withdrawal in Virginia goes to power plants, and that energy conservation steps might save more water than actual water conservation steps. Even our diet affects water supply. Roughly a third of freshwater withdrawals in the United States go to beef production — primarily to grow the grain that feeds the cattle. Feeding the grain to people instead of cattle would be more efficient water-wise, as well as nutritionally.
Ben Franklin once said, "When the well's dry, we know the worth of water." As the well gets drier, the true costs of our inefficient water use are becoming more apparent. Some are responding with needed conservation efforts. How broadly these measures are adopted will go a long way in determining the course of the coming century — for human relations with each other as well as our relationship to all other life whose survival depends upon the earth's finite supply of fresh water.
For more information, American Rivers (www.americanrivers.org) and the Blue Planet Project (www.blueplanetproject.net/english/) are doing outstanding work on water conservation. To read more about water privatization, check out the comprehensive Water Barons report put out by the Center for Public Integrity (www.icij.org/dtaweb/water/).
Dave Tilford is Senior Writer for the Center for a New American Dream.
Some Water Facts to Ponder
- Global water consumption is doubling every 20 years — twice the rate of population growth
- Three multinational corporations control 80 percent of the privatized water supply
- By 2025 demand is expected to outstrip supply by 55 percent
- 80 percent of all municipal water systems are publicly owned, but there is a growing threat of privatization
- All life depends on sufficient access to clean water
Facts compiled by Tony Clarke (Polaris Institute), Margaret Bowman (American Rivers) and Hans Schoepflin (Panta Rhea Foundation) at a May 2003 teleconference on water.
Saving water in your home
There are many things you can do to conserve water in your own home, from landscaping to fixing leaks to installing simple low-flow showerheads and faucet aerators. Many websites offer conservation tips online. One of the most engaging and comprehensive is the interactive H2Ouse website: www.h2ouse.org.
For those without easy web access, the Water Education Foundation sells a $2.50 Water Conservation Kit for the home. To order, call (916) 444-6240.
Success Story: Saving Water in the Desert
In the early 1990's, water experts in Albuquerque, New Mexico realized the city was on the road to water crisis. The main aquifer from which the city draws water was being depleted much faster than previously projected. Studies showed that other desert cities were using much less water — less than half in Santa Fe's case — than the 250 gallons per capita per day Albuquerquians were consuming. In 1995, the city introduced a comprehensive water conservation plan. The Water Conservation Office produced educational materials and offered monetary incentives with the well-publicized goal of reducing per capita consumption 30 percent by 2004.