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The problem is more where. Water should be expensive where it is scarce, and cheap (or even subsidized) where it is plentiful. Even in different regions inside
by henearkr 3y ago
The problem is more where. Water should be expensive where it is scarce, and cheap (or even subsidized) where it is plentiful. Even in different regions inside the same country.
This also works as a signal to help water-thirsty industries to locate or relocate themselves.
- margalabargala 3y agoThere are good reasons to do things like farming in the desert via irrigation. If water is not an issue, then crops are significantly more productive per acre due to the increased sunlight. Places where water is plentiful tend to be less productive for agriculture due to the increase in cloud cover; a rainy day is a day when the plants get less energy. There's a balance to be struck between using an unsustainable amount of desert water, and using none of it.
- henearkr 3y agoI don't think that the energy cost of irrigating in the desert will ever be sustainable. If you have a counter-example, I'm interested. But I do see the possibility of solving the problem by using photovoltaic energy (though maybe not optimally, because not having to move the water would allow to use the electricity for other usages). Bear in mind that the alternative is to grow crops in countries where it is raining most of the time. Plants fare really really well in rainy countries, they don't mind at all that the sun is less present. The only real drawback is the shortened growing period, if the country is too far north or too far south.