6 ms·
Why is that a comparison that makes sense? If we doubled the water available to tech companies, that wouldn't make them any more productive.
by monochromatic 11y ago
Why is that a comparison that makes sense? If we doubled the water available to tech companies, that wouldn't make them any more productive.
- jkyle 11y agoWe're literally running out of water [1]. As in no more. There are entire counties who get nothing when they turn on their faucets. Nothing. No more. Not to mention the ground is sinking. [1] http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-famiglietti-drought-california-20150313-story.html http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-famiglietti-droug...
- dirtae 11y agoWhich entire counties get nothing when they turn on their faucets?
- jkyle 11y agoTulare ran out not too long ago.
- dirtae 11y agoVisalia is the county seat of Tulare county. I cannot find any articles mentioning that people in Visalia get nothing when they turn on their faucets. Can you link me to a source?
- millzlane 11y agoI found a link. I wasn't able to reply to the commenter below. http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2015/04/30/california-a-state-of-survival/ http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2015/04/30/california-a-state...
- slayed0 11y agoedit: read that as countries, not counties India is getting there [1] [1]http://thewaterproject.org/water-in-crisis-india http://thewaterproject.org/water-in-crisis-india
- jfoutz 11y agoAh, you're concerned about 'entire'. Yes. As of 2014, it's just people without the means or skills to change their situation. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/03/us/california-drought-tulare-county.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/03/us/california-drought-tula... It's more accurate to say, municipal water authorities can no longer meet demand.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- azinman2 11y agoQuite a bit of the central valley. I attended a recent talk by the director of the CA water board, and she said this was her #1 priority... getting them water. The state is currently trucking in bottled water to these communities.
- yellowapple 11y agoIndeed, we're running out of water. That means that we need to know not only how to reduce overall water consumption, but also to prioritize how that water is consumed. I reckon crops (even the less important non-staple ones) are more important than green lawns right now.
- raldi 11y agoIf we instead, e.g., mandate that all showers be painfully low-flow, that hosing down sidewalks is illegal (and thus, they'll often be covered in human poop in the area around Twitter), and other such things that make it less pleasant to live here, workers will be less eager to live here, and thus, it'll be harder to keep the best ones (or even the average ones) from moving to another state or country. And thus, yes, it would make California's tech and other industries less productive, and less competitive with their counterparts elsewhere.
- s73v3r 11y agoThere are lots of other ways to clean off a sidewalk.
- raldi 11y agoAnd there are lots of other places to raise cattle or grow almonds than in a desert.
- yellowapple 11y agoCalifornia (specifically, the Central Valley, where most of California's agriculture is centered) is hardly a desert compared to pretty much everywhere surrounding it save for maybe Oregon.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- raldi 11y agoYou're right, but nonetheless, we could conserve a lot more by making those cattle ranchers, and the alfalfa farmers who supply the feed, pay market rate for water (and, likely, move their operations to another state) than if we got sidewalk spraying down to zero.
- yellowapple 11y ago
- hauget 11y agoWater is a scarce resource in this case. You don't exactly let the "wealthy" buy off everything they can just because. Scarce resources need to be regulated my friend.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y agoRegulation is where scarce resources go to die. Why not find a way to produce more?
- eropple 11y agoDo you seriously think the answer isn't "produce more, and stop using so much until we do"?
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y agoI seriously have no faith that a group of people can regulate things efficiently. It sounds hopeful of course. I have more faith in desalination or some other engineering solution.
- eropple 11y agoSo you are advocating the continued unsustainable use of a scarce common resource, in a way not provably necessary to the good of that commons, because we might be able to efficiently create more of that resource at an unspecified point in time. Well, I'm convinced. I'll burn my house down this winter to keep warm, too.
- shmulkey18 11y agoRead "The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future" and learn why this sort of thinking has been shown to be wrong again and again.
- 11y ago
- simoncion 11y ago"There is currently a water shortfall of about 6 million acre-feet per year, which is being sustained by exploiting non-renewable groundwater and other sources." Via: http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-doing/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-do... (If you haven't read this, you really, really, really should. It's an accessible, level-headed analysis of California's water situation.)