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The same phenomenon is happening is happening in China & India and probably many other parts of he world as well. As we become more a more affluent society, our

The same phenomenon is happening is happening in China & India and probably many other parts of he world as well. As we become more a more affluent society, our on water consumption increases. We need to raise awareness at a global level about preserving and saving water. https://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/04/28-000-rivers-disappeared-in-china-what-happened/275365/ https://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/04/28-000-riv... https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/photos/rivers-run-dry/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/photos/rivers...

quotemstr 7y ago
That, and build lots of desalination plants. We can engineer our way out of this problem without compromising our quality of life.
- VBprogrammer 7y ago
  At what cost? Desalination is not cheap in terms of the energy it uses or even the environmental cost of what to do with the left over brine. We can certainly be less wasteful at home. Flushing toilet waste with potable water and even to some extent using potable water to bath in are incredible wastes of a precious resource.
  - toomuchtodo 7y ago
    The vast majority of water use is agriculture. Skimping in your home doesn't change that.
    - VBprogrammer 7y ago
      To be honest I suspected that and was going to say something about it but then I tried to verify my suspicion and couldn't immediately find a reference for it. From what I did see about 50% of domestic use is watering plants. Getting rid of conventional lawns would be a good start.
      - Scoundreller 7y ago
        Depends how you do it. My mom’s backyard is going from useless lawn to cares-for fruit/veg garden. Water consumption is going up. Dunno if our practices use less than buying what we produce.
        VBprogrammer 7y ago
        To be fair the comparison isn't between growing your own and buying in a grocery store. If you get anything useful out of it then I think that's arguably a better use of water than a lawn.
  - dbt00 7y ago
    They’re trivial wastes of a precious resource. Toilet flushing isn’t a significant consumer of potable water, and retrofitting multiple municipal water lines is expensive for the benefit.
  - RandallBrown 7y ago
    Israel gets like half of their drinking water from desalination. With solar/wind/nuclear/tidal energy, it could be very inexpensive.
    - ricardobeat 7y ago
      Handling the massive amounts of brine resulting from desalination could end up costing a lot. They’re already having issues with it.
    - avip 7y ago
      80% (and counting)
    - driverdan 7y ago
      It's still not inexpensive. Desalination plants cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build.
  - abraae 7y ago
    Can't the brine be dumped back into the sea somewhere, leaving net saltiness the same? I can see that dumping point would become clogged, but presumably that would be only a local environmental issue.
  - lostapathy 7y ago
    How does flushing my toilet from water drawn from a river ... and then pumped back into the same river slightly downstream hurt anything?
    - VBprogrammer 7y ago
      That water is cleaned to within an inch of its life. Pumped for miles and then treated before being returned to the river. The same goes for the gallons of water which is used for showering. Grey water could easily be reused for flushing or watering plants.
      - Scoundreller 7y ago
        Technically easy, but economically terrible if you bother with the permits, sign-offs and buying an approved system when you effectively can’t DIY. I’m waiting for WalMart or Amazon to sell an elegant $500 incinerating toilet and $500 gray water system that’s approved and just needs pipe/power connections. We have the tech to run homes without any sewer connections. Solutions right now seem to be priced/targeted at situations where buyers have no choice.
      - lostapathy 7y ago
        When I use the sink now, the water ends up right where it started, and the next town downstream can use it too. If I watered plants and didn't let the water return to the river, the next town downstream wouldn't be able to do the same thing. For them, it's objectively better for me to send it back to the river than give it to the atmosphere via plants.
        quotemstr 7y ago
        Water doesn't just disappear when plants take it up by the roots.
- raincom 7y ago
  desal may work for 10M people, as Israel has shown. That won't help 300M people in India, another 300M in China.
hombre_fatal 7y ago
Why not just price water to reflect supply realities? Why would anyone care about saving water when it's so dirt cheap? "Awareness" seems like a waste of time in comparison.
- wrong_variable 7y ago
  Being able to "price" something requires existence of a functional market. Markets can only exist when contracts can be enforced. Being able to enforce a contract requires monitoring and ability to issue fines, you also needs appropriate laws. All of the above does not exist when it comes to ground water harvesting - especially in India and even in a police state like China.
  - stirfrykitty 7y ago
    Yet companies build plants on the Great Lakes, hoover up all the water, filter it, bottle it, and sell it to the unsuspecting, who happily buy it. I never ever saw bottled water as a kid in Europe. It wasn't until I moved to the US where it appeared to be commonplace. When I went back home to England last year, they've got it in every supermarket I visited. Sad, really. I still just drink out of the tap here in Texas.
    - swimfar 7y ago
      What you wrote about bottled water not being a thing in Europe is definitely country specific. When I lived in Germany none of my German friends drank water from the tap. They would buy packs of bottled water for drinking at home.
    - brianwawok 7y ago
      Depends on where exactly you live. Much of the US cities have great tap water. Some places (Flint) get lead going on. However, much of the water in the US by area is well water. Well water tastes gross, and has some dubious health effects if not filtered right. Bottled water seems reasonable for those people. Just because bottled water is not useful for you, does not mean it's not useful for anyone.
stunt 7y ago
It’s happening everywhere and one of the reasons is probably population. Earth was never crowded as it’s today.
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  Everybody is thinking it, but no one is saying it: "too many people". I feel like that's why the apocalypse, post-apoc, and zombie movies are so popular. They catch that subconscious zeitgeist of loathing their neighbors and feeling like they're surrounded by the "NPC" meme.

quotemstr 7y ago

That, and build lots of desalination plants. We can engineer our way out of this problem without compromising our quality of life.

VBprogrammer 7y ago
At what cost? Desalination is not cheap in terms of the energy it uses or even the environmental cost of what to do with the left over brine. We can certainly be less wasteful at home. Flushing toilet waste with potable water and even to some extent using potable water to bath in are incredible wastes of a precious resource.
- toomuchtodo 7y ago
  The vast majority of water use is agriculture. Skimping in your home doesn't change that.
  - VBprogrammer 7y ago
    To be honest I suspected that and was going to say something about it but then I tried to verify my suspicion and couldn't immediately find a reference for it. From what I did see about 50% of domestic use is watering plants. Getting rid of conventional lawns would be a good start.
    - Scoundreller 7y ago
      Depends how you do it. My mom’s backyard is going from useless lawn to cares-for fruit/veg garden. Water consumption is going up. Dunno if our practices use less than buying what we produce.
      - VBprogrammer 7y ago
        To be fair the comparison isn't between growing your own and buying in a grocery store. If you get anything useful out of it then I think that's arguably a better use of water than a lawn.
- dbt00 7y ago
  They’re trivial wastes of a precious resource. Toilet flushing isn’t a significant consumer of potable water, and retrofitting multiple municipal water lines is expensive for the benefit.
- RandallBrown 7y ago
  Israel gets like half of their drinking water from desalination. With solar/wind/nuclear/tidal energy, it could be very inexpensive.
  - ricardobeat 7y ago
    Handling the massive amounts of brine resulting from desalination could end up costing a lot. They’re already having issues with it.
  - avip 7y ago
    80% (and counting)
  - driverdan 7y ago
    It's still not inexpensive. Desalination plants cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build.
- abraae 7y ago
  Can't the brine be dumped back into the sea somewhere, leaving net saltiness the same? I can see that dumping point would become clogged, but presumably that would be only a local environmental issue.
- lostapathy 7y ago
  How does flushing my toilet from water drawn from a river ... and then pumped back into the same river slightly downstream hurt anything?
  - VBprogrammer 7y ago
    That water is cleaned to within an inch of its life. Pumped for miles and then treated before being returned to the river. The same goes for the gallons of water which is used for showering. Grey water could easily be reused for flushing or watering plants.
    - Scoundreller 7y ago
      Technically easy, but economically terrible if you bother with the permits, sign-offs and buying an approved system when you effectively can’t DIY. I’m waiting for WalMart or Amazon to sell an elegant $500 incinerating toilet and $500 gray water system that’s approved and just needs pipe/power connections. We have the tech to run homes without any sewer connections. Solutions right now seem to be priced/targeted at situations where buyers have no choice.
    - lostapathy 7y ago
      When I use the sink now, the water ends up right where it started, and the next town downstream can use it too. If I watered plants and didn't let the water return to the river, the next town downstream wouldn't be able to do the same thing. For them, it's objectively better for me to send it back to the river than give it to the atmosphere via plants.
      - quotemstr 7y ago
        Water doesn't just disappear when plants take it up by the roots.
raincom 7y ago
desal may work for 10M people, as Israel has shown. That won't help 300M people in India, another 300M in China.

hombre_fatal 7y ago

Why not just price water to reflect supply realities? Why would anyone care about saving water when it's so dirt cheap? "Awareness" seems like a waste of time in comparison.

wrong_variable 7y ago
Being able to "price" something requires existence of a functional market. Markets can only exist when contracts can be enforced. Being able to enforce a contract requires monitoring and ability to issue fines, you also needs appropriate laws. All of the above does not exist when it comes to ground water harvesting - especially in India and even in a police state like China.
- stirfrykitty 7y ago
  Yet companies build plants on the Great Lakes, hoover up all the water, filter it, bottle it, and sell it to the unsuspecting, who happily buy it. I never ever saw bottled water as a kid in Europe. It wasn't until I moved to the US where it appeared to be commonplace. When I went back home to England last year, they've got it in every supermarket I visited. Sad, really. I still just drink out of the tap here in Texas.
  - swimfar 7y ago
    What you wrote about bottled water not being a thing in Europe is definitely country specific. When I lived in Germany none of my German friends drank water from the tap. They would buy packs of bottled water for drinking at home.
  - brianwawok 7y ago
    Depends on where exactly you live. Much of the US cities have great tap water. Some places (Flint) get lead going on. However, much of the water in the US by area is well water. Well water tastes gross, and has some dubious health effects if not filtered right. Bottled water seems reasonable for those people. Just because bottled water is not useful for you, does not mean it's not useful for anyone.

stunt 7y ago

It’s happening everywhere and one of the reasons is probably population. Earth was never crowded as it’s today.

blaser-waffle 7y ago
Everybody is thinking it, but no one is saying it: "too many people". I feel like that's why the apocalypse, post-apoc, and zombie movies are so popular. They catch that subconscious zeitgeist of loathing their neighbors and feeling like they're surrounded by the "NPC" meme.