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We could produce the same amount of food with a tenth the water we do currently. A simple system, like drip irrigation, could save 50%. An ebb and flow hydrop

We could produce the same amount of food with a tenth the water we do currently. A simple system, like drip irrigation, could save 50%. An ebb and flow hydroponic system could save 95%. These technologies aren't new, they're just not cost effective until water becomes less cheap. I think in 20 or 50 years we'll look back at the current sprinklers that just spray water into the air as ridiculously wasteful.

vram22 12y ago
>We could produce the same amount of food with a tenth the water we do currently. ... A simple system, like drip irrigation, could save 50%. I was thinking exactly the same thing after reading the OP and the first few comments of this HN thread. Israel and other countries use drip irrigation very effectively. But if climate change happens on a large enough scale and with enough effect, we will have more problems than can be solved by drip irrigation alone.
alexqgb 12y ago
The degree to which agribusiness in CA has been able to block any and all rational water regulation in the legislature is simultaneously awful and encouraging. Awful, because oh my god just look; the way they're handling this resource is demonstrably terrible. Encouraging because we are so amazingly far away from running an efficient enterprise. I suspect the Israelis could farm for a century using the same amount of water squandered by the Central Valley in a single season. Okay, that's an slight exaggeration. But only slight.
- fredup 12y ago
  It is certainly an exaggeration. A more accurate number could be 7-9 years. Israel uses 1016 million m^3 of water [1] or about 800,000 acre feet on agriculture per year. While studies have shown that California as a whole could save 5.6-6.6 million acre feet per year while maintaining productivity and the same acreage farmed [2]. It is a bit more difficult to restrict the number to the central valley, but the central valley accounts for more than half of California's total agriculture [3], so we can just use the statewide number. The entire state's annual agricultural water usage is less than 45 million acre feet [2]. Even if Israel had all of this water they would max out at under 60 years. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in_Israel#Water_use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in... 2. http://www.nrdc.org/water/files/ca-water-supply-solutions-ag-efficiency-IB.pdf http://www.nrdc.org/water/files/ca-water-supply-solutions-ag..., p.2 3. http://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/California/Publications/California_Ag_Statistics/Reports/2012cas-all.pdf http://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/California/Publ... p.22-38
  - alexqgb 12y ago
    This is really super information. Many thanks. And yes, 7-9 years isn't close to 100. But if you think in terms of salary, and what it would mean to squander nearly all of what you make in a decade in a single year, you realize how completely detached from reality CA agribusiness has become. These guys are in for a really hard and nasty shock.

vram22 12y ago

>We could produce the same amount of food with a tenth the water we do currently. ... A simple system, like drip irrigation, could save 50%. I was thinking exactly the same thing after reading the OP and the first few comments of this HN thread. Israel and other countries use drip irrigation very effectively. But if climate change happens on a large enough scale and with enough effect, we will have more problems than can be solved by drip irrigation alone.

alexqgb 12y ago

The degree to which agribusiness in CA has been able to block any and all rational water regulation in the legislature is simultaneously awful and encouraging. Awful, because oh my god just look; the way they're handling this resource is demonstrably terrible. Encouraging because we are so amazingly far away from running an efficient enterprise. I suspect the Israelis could farm for a century using the same amount of water squandered by the Central Valley in a single season. Okay, that's an slight exaggeration. But only slight.

fredup 12y ago
It is certainly an exaggeration. A more accurate number could be 7-9 years. Israel uses 1016 million m^3 of water [1] or about 800,000 acre feet on agriculture per year. While studies have shown that California as a whole could save 5.6-6.6 million acre feet per year while maintaining productivity and the same acreage farmed [2]. It is a bit more difficult to restrict the number to the central valley, but the central valley accounts for more than half of California's total agriculture [3], so we can just use the statewide number. The entire state's annual agricultural water usage is less than 45 million acre feet [2]. Even if Israel had all of this water they would max out at under 60 years. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in_Israel#Water_use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in... 2. http://www.nrdc.org/water/files/ca-water-supply-solutions-ag-efficiency-IB.pdf http://www.nrdc.org/water/files/ca-water-supply-solutions-ag..., p.2 3. http://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/California/Publications/California_Ag_Statistics/Reports/2012cas-all.pdf http://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/California/Publ... p.22-38
- alexqgb 12y ago
  This is really super information. Many thanks. And yes, 7-9 years isn't close to 100. But if you think in terms of salary, and what it would mean to squander nearly all of what you make in a decade in a single year, you realize how completely detached from reality CA agribusiness has become. These guys are in for a really hard and nasty shock.