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The End of California?
- hyperion2010 11y agoThe solution to this problem is very, very simple: actually force farmers to pay market price for the water they use. The end.
- rscott 11y agoThat's not what I would call simple. America has a long history of subsidizing farmers, which in turn keeps food prices down.
- bradleyjg 11y agoNot all food subsidies keep food prices down. For example, several crops have dedicated programs where the government keeps a significant portion of the annual crop off the open market as a means of keeping the price high (see the recent SCOTUS case about raisins). Then there's things like ethanol mandates which act as a subsidy to farmers but increase both the cost of food and the cost of gasoline. An even bigger problem are import tariffs and other forms of protectionism that again subsidize farmers but increase prices. Food stamps are a far far better way of subsidizing food for the poor than through a rube goldberg system of supposedly helping the poor by giving millions to huge agribusinesses. So much so that I consider those types of arguments a bit of a red herring. Along with the "food security" argument -- there's no impeding worldwide embargo of the united states and if there were calories would be the least of our problems.
- sampo 11y ago> America has a long history of subsidizing farmers, which in turn keeps food prices down. I would assume that instead of keeping food prices down, farming subsidies will drive farming land prices up.
- EC1 11y agoFarmers starve, up the price, now I'm paying $12 for an Orange. Nice solution.
- wmil 11y agoProduction of water inefficient crops would shift to states with water, Cali famers would shift to more efficient crops. The US is a big country, there's no need to grow almonds in the desert.
- jkestner 11y agoAs long as you're fine with us, in turn, paying market price for those foods they grow.
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- WalterSear 11y ago"The California drought of today is mostly nature’s hand, diminishing an Eden created by man." FFS. And the repeated mantra of almonds, along with not one mention of meat. It's nothing but hubris and ignorance.
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- dragontamer 11y ago> It takes 106 gallons of water to produce an ounce of beef — which is more than the average San Francisco Bay Area resident uses in a day. Good job reading the article before commenting on it. </sarcasm>
- Eric_WVGG 11y agoit’s there, midway down — “It takes 106 gallons of water to produce an ounce of beef — which is more than the average San Francisco Bay Area resident uses in a day.” I did a double take at that line you quoted, though.
- batbomb 11y agoThose figures are based off of grain fed, mass produced cattle. Assuming that all such grains originate in California, or even that it applies to all meat, is silly. They are not accurate for grass fed beef. Around Petaluma, for example, the cows graze on grass that is not irrigated. They may be supplemented with grain in the winter months. A cow itself, not including water used to grow feed, will consume about 30-55 gallons of water to every hanging pound. You can do this calculation yourself: A decent hanging weight of a cow is about 600 pounds. A cow drinks ~25 gallons a day, and goes to slaughter around age 3. (25x365x3)/600.
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- claar 11y agoSam Altman: "it's remarkable how many other problems reduce to the energy problem" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9239063 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9239063 I hope in 100 years, a "water shortage" on earth will be a silly concept, as you can always just pull more from the ocean.
- melling 11y agoYou don't think there will be consequences to massive desalination? http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-impacts-of-relying-on-desalination/ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-impacts-of-rel...
- CHY872 11y agoThere won't be. Scientific intuition and the available studies suggest that apart from perhaps in the immediate vicinity of where they pump the salt back in, the effect is minimal, no matter how much desalination you perform. It's what you'd expect, in fact. The state of California (if my back of envelope calculations are correct) uses in total about 66 cubic kilometres of water each year. If you produced California's entire water supply by desalination, this would be akin to removing 1/10,000,000 of the Pacific's water every year. It's a miniscule amount, and is of order of magnitude the same as not letting the Colorado reach the ocean.
- markkat 11y agoI've wondered if cargo ships couldn't use the very salty water as a source of electricity (ion gradient), slowly draining the saltier water as it traverses the ocean.
- cpeterso 11y agoOr could the very salty water be used, somehow, for renewable energy storage for off-peak hours?
- melling 11y ago
- dxbydt 11y agoIs this a particular style of writing ? He takes 3 sentences, makes 1 paragraph. Then repeats with the next 3, and the next 3 etc. The paragraphs are completely disjoint - so he mentions almonds in a para, then Romney in another, then Glenn Beck, then something about Yosemite....its like a whirlwind tour of the drought landscape with no central thesis or conclusion. No flow, just lots of disparate facts. What is his point ? How exactly does one go from one freak drought to the end of California, which has what - the fourth or fifth largest GDP on the whole planet ( if it were a country ) ?
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- throwaway344 11y ago8th. http://www.ccsce.com/PDF/Numbers-July-2014-CA-Economy-Rankings-2013.pdf http://www.ccsce.com/PDF/Numbers-July-2014-CA-Economy-Rankin...
- FullyFunctional 11y agoInteresting, thanks, but those are 2013 numbers. The article claims California grew/is growing faster than Texas which isn't the case in your linked report, so I wonder where one might find more recent data.
- chomp 11y agoThis is the most recent I could find, I can't vouch for the accuracy/truthfulness of the data though: https://www.aei.org/publication/texas-great-american-job-machine-solely-responsible-1m-net-us-job-increase-since-2007/ https://www.aei.org/publication/texas-great-american-job-mac...
- mturmon 11y agoI agree. He's strung together a bunch of anecdotes and currently-voguish facts, without doing his homework and calling our attention to the most important effects. He has no real POV about how this plays out, he just seesaws between optimism about creative solutions and worry. I'm a NYT subscriber, so I'm pre-disposed to their viewpoints and style, but this column is really junky.
- AdamFernandez 11y agoWhy do crops need to be grown in California or 'shipped' to China? Can't these crops be provided by other states in the U.S. that are more conducive to farming? It seems California is not a great state for farming, and was engineered to be suitable. I understand the economic value to the state, but using 80% of the water during a drought? It seems like an incredible waste of resources for the financial gain of a single state.
- dragonwriter 11y ago> Why do crops need to be grown in California or 'shipped' to China? Can't these crops be provided by other states in the U.S. that are more conducive to farming? If they could, they would. > It seems California is not a great state for farming, and was engineered to be suitable. No place is a great place for modern farming, which requires considerable man-made infrastructure in any case. But in terms of things that you can't easily engineer around (except, recently, fresh water within a convenient collection area) California is a very good place for farming.
- pkaye 11y agoWhat about Colorado? Seems like a good place for agriculture. And they are getting more rain than California at this time.
- cwal37 11y agoDoes Colorado[1] really look like such a great place to grow crops? Particularly in the context of what we're talking about here, water availability, snowpack changes, etc. Also, Colorado via Drought Monitor[3]. Iowa[2] for comparison. [1] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Colorado/@38.9252672,-105.5452078,540625m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x874014749b1856b7:0xc75483314990a7ff https://www.google.com/maps/place/Colorado/@38.9252672,-105.... [2] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Iowa/@41.9383166,-93.3897979,517519m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x87ee5e6ff1f86019:0xc6ef634a57c759d9 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Iowa/@41.9383166,-93.38979... [3] http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?CO http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?...
- istvan__ 11y agoWhere I live the management companies are watering the decoration plantation every day regardless if it was raining the previous day or not. The also have some leaks, but guess what, they don't care because they are not motivated financially to solve these problems. If you report them to the authorities they simply defer the cost to the renters. Now, the question is how long it takes it the local authorities to close these loopholes and put effective measure to stop wasting water. Wait, they are also not interested. Nevermind. :)
- greggman 11y agoI've never seen a municipal/public grass area that isn't over watered in California. Drive down some street that has a grass covered divider or grass lined public areas between the sidewalk and the street. Come by when it's being watered. Watch the water run all over the street instead of in the grass. That of course then makes every car that goes by dirty which then has to be washed (more water)
- mturmon 11y agoThis has begun to change -- not fast enough, though, I agree. LADWP and the City of LA have both begun to convert their own buildings' landscaping to drought-tolerant plantings. It's very slow, I think because of a color-of-money issue. Upkeep may come from a already-available pile of cash, while replacement comes from a different and much smaller pile. Also, for a couple of years now, LADWP has been offering cash payments to customers who replace their lawn with drought-tolerant plants (http://www.ladwp.cafriendlylandscaping.com http://www.ladwp.cafriendlylandscaping.com). It's having a noticeable effect, although I have to say that many of the jobs done by contractors are atrocious. Exhibit A is these guys, http://turfterminators.com http://turfterminators.com, who will replace your front yard with 2'' stones and a few sad succulents for free, and claim your DWP payment. I removed my lawn 14 years ago.
- ktdrv 11y agoThe article could be one word long: "No!" But I guess that does not sell as many ads.
- TheCapn 11y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- Spooky23 11y agoThis paragraph really captures the essence of the problem: "But California, from this drought onward, will be a state transformed. The Dust Bowl of the 1930s was human-caused, after the grasslands of the Great Plains were ripped up, and the land thrown to the wind. It never fully recovered. The California drought of today is mostly nature’s hand, diminishing an Eden created by man. The Golden State may recover, but it won’t be the same place."
- jbob2000 11y agoWhen will the state do something about this? Or are they? I've only heard about lawn watering bans. That seems like a pittance compared to the real abusers. I feel like California is going to wake up one day and say "Well, shit, we knew this was coming and we did nothing".
- nomass 11y agoI find the entire development very terrifying. Even if I don't live in the US and being not particularly interested I've heard about California’s water problem more then 10 ago. That means the problems and dangers are well know a relatively long time ago. There is a ton of publications and research on various levels and domains. It seems to me that we are completely incapable to handle the challenges that come with (finite) natural resources. Our system works as long as it works and then it halts full stop. Like a massive train, there is no change of course.
- humanrebar 11y agoI'm confused why the price per gallon for water isn't skyrocketing in California. If the state is artificially keeping the price low, of course people aren't going to change their habits and business models. And the end game is running out of water instead of innovating to keep your water bill down.
- k-mcgrady 11y agoJust a guess but if you're talking about tap water costs raising those would hit the poorest the worst. Secondly if they raise them high enough it becomes better financially to purchase bottled water (which I assume wouldn't rise in price as much as the companies producing that are global businesses and a spike in demand in one area shouldn't affect the overall pricing too much) - again not a problem for those that can afford it.
- DanBlake 11y agoWater costs less than a half cent per gallon. Water could double, triple or quadruple in price and still be 'affordable' for the poor to drink. It certainly would not cause them to drink bottled water, which is like 10,000x more expensive- But, Shorter showers and no more watered lawns? Absolutely. But if all it takes to survive for a family of four to have clean drinking water is 5 cents, i think you might be claiming it impacts the poor a little bit too far.
- ianferrel 11y ago
- fweespeech 11y agoI find the article quite disingenuous given it doesn't admit the reality of the situation. If California stops being used to farm cash crops for export outside of California [as it is currently], the "water problem" will mysteriously vanish overnight. Even with droughts. http://aic.ucdavis.edu/pub/exports.html http://aic.ucdavis.edu/pub/exports.html http://ajed.assembly.ca.gov/sites/ajed.assembly.ca.gov/files/Fast%20Facts%20on%20California%27s%20Agricultural%20Economy.pdf http://ajed.assembly.ca.gov/sites/ajed.assembly.ca.gov/files... > In 2013, the total amount of agriculture and livestock products exported from California to the world totaled $13.7 billion. http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/05/_10_percent_of_california_s_water_goes_to_almond_farming.html http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/0... > By all accounts the current water crisis is far more urgent in the sprawling fields of the Central Valley. And that’s bad news for those of us who enjoy eating daily. Two simple facts explain why: California is the most productive agricultural state in the union, and agriculture uses 80 percent of California’s water. In a year with practically none of the stuff, that’s enough to send ripple effects throughout the country. > Almonds alone use about 10 percent of California’s total water supply each year. That’s nuts. But almonds are also the state’s most lucrative exported agricultural product, with California producing 80 percent of the world’s supply. Alfalfa hay requires even more water, about 15 percent of the state’s supply. About 70 percent of alfalfa grown in California is used in dairies, and a good portion of the rest is exported to land-poor Asian countries like Japan. Yep, that’s right: In the middle of a drought, farmers are shipping fresh hay across the Pacific Ocean. The water that’s locked up in exported hay amounts to about 100 billion gallons per year—enough to supply 1 million families with drinking water for a year.
- jodah 11y agoAmong the many well-known statistics cited in the article, absent was the less known point that half of California farms still use open ditch irrigation. It makes many of the other discussions about crop selection and municipal conservation seem trivial.
- poke111 11y agoIf only there were some science dedicated to the study of allocation of scarce resources, the practitioners of which may be able to offer some advice...
- primroot 11y agobut... who needs science when you can have free markets?