2 ms·

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.

by 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.

by alexqgb 12y ago

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.