You Can't Drink Oil Or Eat A Lawn - The Value of Water and Lessons from The California Drought

I was young, but I remember well what was then the great California drought of 1976. We endured short showers, brown lawns, and acquiesced to mottoes like: if it's brown, flush it down, if it's yellow, let it mellow, with a certain pride, at least in my family, of knowing that we were doing our part to live within the ecological means of our state. My patient father acceded to my plan to convert our front yard from a typical green lawn to a xeriscaped native plant garden in the '80's. The yard was always a beautiful, multi-hued burst of flowers for a brief period in the spring before it withdrew to its less diverse green hues of summer and winter, but my father seemed to appreciate the lower water bill, lower maintenance, and perhaps the knowledge that he was working with nature, instead of against it. Unfortunately these benefits were not universally recognized, as one of the first things the new owners did when my parents sold the place in the mid 90's was to replace the well established native plants with the conventional and ubiquitous lawn.

Flash forward to 2015, the middle of a multi-year extreme drought when the population of the state is about double and the GDP more than 10 times what it was in 1976. There are millions more immigrants, many from places that are greener, who desire the lush lawn and landscape more familiar to them, farmers have had 40 more years to become more accustomed to their water entitlements, and large water consuming businesses to theirs. My home state is, once again, a bellwether as to the management of the environment and a critical resource in the face of rapidly growing population in an industrialized region.

There is certainly no natural resource more critical to our survival and more taken for granted than water, except perhaps for the air we breathe. California, the most populous state in the USA, has predominately an arid or semiarid climate, and yet the vast majority of residents until recently gave little or no thought to creating artificial lush meadows or verdant subtropical landscapes and letting the excess sprinkler water run down the driveways to the gutter. Only after several consecutive years of seeing reservoirs shrink and sparse snow pack shorten ski seasons, and finally government mandates with fines and other financial penalties are many realizing the true costs of that lush lawn, and even so residents have not come anywhere near the 25% cuts mandated by the governor from the same month previous year. Tiered pricing of water may help some to recognize the true value of water, and should be implemented, but that has been made more difficult by a recent court ruling:

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-water-rates-20150507-story.html#page=1

Not all residents have an equal water footprint. The spectrum is broad, from the apartment renter to the multimillionaire with the large, park-like landscaped yard. Those with the greatest urban or suburban area stewardship, those with the wealth necessary to afford large lots in a very expensive part of the world, are least likely to be convinced to convert their emerald landscapes to something a bit sparser and a few shades browner. Likewise owners and managers of golf courses and cemeteries, large industrial and educational campuses, and countless miles of  ill considered (in terms of water use) city and highway landscaping are recognizing they have big decisions and adjustments to make, and water consuming industries, including water bottling plants are drawing much scrutiny. Something very troubling and symptomatic of the difficulty in solving a long term water crisis are found in the two industries that were exempted from the governor's mandated water use reductions: oil production and agriculture, industries with representatives rife with money and political influence.

I remember always being entranced by the endless long flooded furrows that seemed to line the Central Valley of California from one end to the other. I marveled at the ingenuity and arrogance that converted this landscape from once diverse grassland / savannah in the north and semiarid to arid desert in the south, which contained large wetland and riparian areas along its rivers and even large lakes that once supported some of the densest native American populations in North America to the ubiquitous neat green rows of various crops that produce 25% of the nations food supply. Irrigation has always been a necessity for agriculture in California where precipitation in the growing regions fall almost solely in the winter. Historically, abundant snowfall in the Sierras fed the numerous rivers that drained to the Central Valley, filling the valley's large aquifer and later the reservoirs constructed to store water through the dry summers. It's no surprise that with the mild climate, very fertile soils, and access (with manipulation) to abundant water supply California, and the Central Valley in particular, has become the principal supplier of so many of our nation's, and a few of the world's, crops. Large scale manipulation of water in California was instigated by the hydraulic extraction of gold during the 1849 gold rush and the soon to follow agricultural gold rush spurred by advances in technology and transportation, and by global demand over the next few decades. The race to secure water for the fast growing cities and booming agricultural areas of the state had much of the old west and gold rush mentality about it. Unfortunately, to this day California remains saddled with a hodgepodge of irrigation and water management districts overseeing a vast network of surface water canals, a grand, environmentally ill conceived state and federal water program that redirects water from places ecologically adapted to having it to dry places where money and power screamed loudest, a lack of regulation of  groundwater extraction, and an archaic first come first served water distribution system in which farms with the oldest water rights have first access to available water, precluding incentives for some to save water even during this historic drought. Due to this last factor it's still not very uncommon to see wasteful flood irrigation in the valley.

http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/report/r_211ehchapter1r.pdf


Something that has changed with California agriculture within the last two or three decades is the explosion in planting of high water use perennial fruit and nut trees and vines, including grapes, walnuts, and infamously thirsty almonds, which alone now use 10 percent of the water consumed in California. Easy adjustments are not made from year to year with perennial crops. These are a long term investment and require a long term water commitment. Demand for wine grapes and fruit and nut crops like almonds, walnuts, peaches, citrus and avocados, among many others, is increasing rapidly both in the US and in Asia, and California is conveniently located to export to the economic juggernaut to our east.


http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/05/_10_percent_of_california_s_water_goes_to_almond_farming.html

http://www.cdfa.ca.gov/statistics/

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/Historical_Data/index.asp

Growing Asian demand for meat and dairy products is also fueling the growth in planting of water intensive alfalfa and other animal feed crops. The export of all these high water use crops essentially means that drought stricken California is exporting a good percentage of  its agricultural water, which is about three fourths of the water used by people in the state, this despite the fact that agriculture, though a multi-billion dollar industry accounts for only about 2% of the state's economy.

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-04-13/cows-suck-up-more-of-california-s-water-than-almonds

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/04/150409-water-agriculture-cattle-dairy-conservation-ngfood/

A certain amount of denial is needed to live in California, to build on a fault line primed to unleash the next big one, to live atop a chaparral hillside ready to slide in the next heavy rain or burn in the next dry season conflagration. Still, it is unfathomable to me how a state which prides itself on being home to Silicon Valley, the technology capital of the world, could be the last in the nation to regulate or even monitor groundwater extraction. In normal rainfall years groundwater accounts for 40% of the water used in California and at that rate already exceeds the recharge rate, but in drought years this increases to 60%. Farmers, who even in normal rainfall years depend partially on groundwater from the Central Valley's aquifer, have survived this drought largely by depleting it to record low levels so that drilling companies cannot keep up with demand for wells that are drilled to depths formerly unimagined. Experts warn the depletion has already permanently decreased the capacity of the aquifer and caused land to subside substantially in many areas. It's not difficult to understand the denial involved in this dangerous race for every drop of ground water, after all, groundwater is just that, underground, something you can't see, and if your neighbors are doing it, why shouldn't you? However, in this instance the stakes are too high to bury our heads in the sand and hope it works out. California provides over half of our nation's fruits, nuts, and vegetables and climate history and climate change predictions both strongly suggest that with continued abnegation of oversight drought will eventually outlast the capacity of its aquifers, especially when coupled with other water demands from the rapid population growth of the state. The just signed groundwater law in California doesn't even take effect until 2020, and gives farmers until the 2040's to reach an ambiguously defined water sustainability. If this epic drought continues, or if punctuated drought becomes the norm, that may be far too late.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/08/140815-central-valley-california-drilling-boom-groundwater-drought-wells/ 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/06/science/beneath-california-crops-groundwater-crisis-grows.html

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2014/02/04/epic-california-drought-and-groundwater-where-do-we-go-from-here/

http://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/water-and-drought/article17268866.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/08/140819-groundwater-california-drought-aquifers-hidden-crisis/

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2014/07/30/groundwater-depletion-in-colorado-river-basin-adds-big-risks-to-water-security/

The only real long term solution for for the flow of water through the agriculture system, as the flow of money in maintaining a household, is to achieve a balance, work within your means, and save for a (non) rainy day, or year, or multi decade. We must acknowledge the limits of a natural system and do our best to work with it. Most of the solutions are simple in theory: fix leaks and inefficiencies in the delivery system, recycle certain types of wastewater, remove archaic water laws, and let the bartering of the actual, carefully studied and scientifically determined sustainable water supply dicatate agriculture's decisions. Perhaps in dry times much land will have to go fallow in order to support high value perennial crops. Maybe it makes sense to grow crops that are ideally suited to the area even if they use more water, things like nuts, almonds, apricots, and citrus, but many crops can be and should be grown elsewhere. In the U.S. we should remove the incentives to grow only corn and soybeans on so much fertile land and support a more diverse local agriculture. We can do our part, even as owners or renters of small lots: remove some of that grass and grow our own food. We've done this in times of war and shortage in the past and can do it again for perhaps a more enduring shortage:

http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe40s/crops_02.html

Each nation must consider its water supply on a national level and perhaps even beyond that.

While the importance of the agriculture industry to our nation cannot be denied, freshwater is a finite and critical resource that we must recognize as such. Farmers, particularly in an arid and populous part of the world such as California, can no longer look at water as an entitlement. Water from all sources, including ground water, must be allocated based on land area and careful study of predicted available and sustainable supplies. Although groundwater may be out of sight it is out of mind at our own peril. The archaic first rights system must be treated as what it has been, a nice ride for a few for quite a long time, but something that must be abandoned for the realities of the present and future. It's ridiculous to believe that a large percentage of the agricultural production, and of the population of the United States, should be shackled in perpetuity by an uninformed ad hoc system, created over a century ago, for the allotment of such a critical resource as water.

Something even more telling in the relationship between water, money, and political power is apparent in the other exemption from California's water restrictions, the oil extraction industry. There is something both disheartening and nefarious in Governor Jerry Brown's once exemplary environmental record being blackened by his support for fracking to the detriment of water, climate, agriculture, and people. Albeit not a large percentage of overall water use in the state, oil and gas extraction industries use millions of gallons of freshwater a day in the process. The exact number is unknown because as with the makeup of the toxic and carcinogenic utilized in the extraction there have been no requirements for disclosure until this year. Contamination of the shrinking water supply by oil and gas extraction poses perhaps a greater threat to the resource than the amount it wastes in extraction. Much of this tremendous amount of very toxic wastewater is disposed of, either by placing in open pits to evaporate or injecting the highly toxic mess into underground aquifers which are supposed to be deep enough to avoid contamination of water supply aquifers. However, the incompetence or complicity of the regulatory agency/ies charged with overseeing wastewater disposal has led to numerous allowed and illegal contamination events to drinking water aquifers and seepage or spills into irrigation canals. In perhaps some kind of effort to put a green spin or appear to be mitigating the tremendous waste of water some fracking companies are selling what they claim is recycled water clean enough to use in agriculture, although an independent group has found the water to be highly contaminated with toxic compounds. We cannot continue to look on with apathy as large, self interested corporations make the decisions, set the rules for our land, air, and water while we pay the price with our health and the safety of our nation's food supply.

http://www.thenation.com/article/180303/if-jerry-brown-so-green-why-he-allowing-fracking-california

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-drought-oil-water-20150503-story.html#page=1

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Waste-Water-from-Oil-Fracking-Injected-into-Clean-Aquifers-282733051.html

http://rt.com/usa/240145-california-fracking-wastewater-chemicals/

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-fracking-20150211-story.html#page=1

California is far from the only place experiencing decreasing water supplies due to climate change and unwise human use and manipulation of natural water sources. Across the globe lakes and rivers are drying and shrinking. In parts of the mideast and elsewhere this is causing political tensions and crop shortages. Groundwater is being depleted, in California this is causing vast areas of land subsidence and in Florida perhaps sinkholes, and in both increased depletion and salinization of aquifers. The Ogallala aquifer, the main water source for the wheat, corn, cattle, and cotton produced in the Great Plains is being rapidly depleted. The two most populous nations in the world, China and India, are experiencing the double edged sword of depletion and pollution of their water resources due to increased demand, changing climate, and mismanagement of water and pollutants. Water scarcity appears to be a significant factor in causing the conflict in Syria and elsewhere in the mideast:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/is-a-lack-of-water-to-blame-for-the-conflict-in-syria-72513729/?no-ist

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/science/earth/study-links-syria-conflict-to-drought-caused-by-climate-change.html?_r=0

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/09/10/drought-helped-caused-syrias-war-will-climate-change-bring-more-like-it/

Even brief but intense drought in areas accustomed to plenty of water can lead to acute shortages causing political acrimony, such as the 2007 drought in the southeastern US which led to argument over water allocation in the Chattahoochee River between three states. In all of these instances misguided decision makers see the first solution in engineering, something we can build our way out of with dams and megacanals. As with road construction in congested regions this may work as a short term fix but unlike with road construction and traffic we can deplete even imported water. We only need to look to the Colorado River for evidence. The cycling of water through and within the land from snowmelt to streams and rivers and wetlands that recharge aquifers and to the vegetation that recharges the atmosphere for precipitation is a very complex and delicate system and each manipulation of this resource, our dams, canals, drainage ditches, flood control and irrigation projects, groundwater extraction, deforestation and pollution, including CO2 pollution, perturb this system to some degree. When taken en masse we should not be surprised that water shortage is expected to be one of the greatest challenges for mankind in the future.

I remember, with the difficult decision of leaving my home state, consoling myself somewhat with the thought that by removing myself from it I was decreasing in some miniscule amount the demands on the beautiful, but even then overly allocated place. I think again of the under appreciated pulchritude of the varied hues and forms of the native plants in our front yard, and of the fish, not just the salmon but also the more subdued native minnows and the endangered delta smelt, often derided as an expendable baitfish, that I used to study in the cool mountain streams, the central valley rivers and the delta. All of these have a beauty if not in color, then in form, function, and adaptation, which, if lost, is to our detriment. We need to recognize in the current plight of California the cautionary tale for us all, that even a society that prides itself on being among the most advanced in the world is not immune from the laws and limits of nature, and can be brought to its knees if something as fundamental to our existence as water is taken for granted.



General Water Shortage Info:

http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/water/interesting-water-facts/

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2010/07/20/america_water_shortages_loom/

http://www.businessinsider.com/facts-about-the-water-crisis-2012-6#

California Water Crisis: 

http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-chronicling-californias-drought-story-gallery-20140925-storygallery.html


http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/us/california-drought-tests-history-of-endless-growth.html

http://www.swrcb.ca.gov/press_room/press_releases/2014/pr121814.pdf

 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/04/150402-california-snowpack-drought-water-science/

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140325-california-drought-subsidence-groundwater/

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/04/140421-california-almonds-drought-central-valley-groundwater/

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/california-drought/almond-farmers-message-drought-critics-we-are-not-villain-n353836

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-gov-brown-agriculture-water-restrictions-20150405-story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/wp/2015/04/03/agriculture-is-80-percent-of-water-use-in-california-why-arent-farmers-being-forced-to-cut-back/

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26124989

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-ag-water-20150403-story.html

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2014/july/groundwater-lane-woods-073114.html

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2015/04/15/398607800/redistribute-californias-water-not-without-a-fight

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2015/05/05/epic-drought-forces-california-grower-to-re-think-water/

http://www.ceres.org/connect-the-drops/join-the-campaign/corporate-water-action/berry-giant-driscoll-joins-effort

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/05/05/california-water-restrictions-missed-targets/26928275/

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/california-drought/ban-bottled-water-industry-scrutinized-parched-california-n357256

http://www.npr.org/2015/04/02/397097043/california-water-experts-explore-how-to-live-with-long-term-drought

http://www.npr.org/2015/04/24/402035003/california-cities-struggle-to-meet-water-conservation-targets

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2015/04/12/398757250/beyond-almonds-a-rogues-gallery-of-guzzlers-in-californias-drought

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2015/04/07/398106067/calif-s-farmers-gulp-most-of-states-water-but-say-theyve-cut-back

http://knowmore.washingtonpost.com/2014/02/27/californias-drought-is-extreme-but-the-government-is-making-it-worse/

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/10/california_central_valley_agriculture_drought_and_climate_change_photos.html

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/05/07/israel-drought-california-desalination/26923503/

http://www.weather.com/climate-weather/drought/news/california-drought-photos-april


Oil and Water:

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/05/05/3654388/california-drought-oil-wastewater-agriculture/

http://desmogblog.com/2015/04/26/how-much-water-does-california-oil-industry-actually-use

http://desmogblog.com/2015/04/08/urban-water-use-restricted-california-regulators-give-oil-industry-two-more-years-operate-injection-wells-groundwater

http://www.ceres.org/issues/water/shale-energy/shale-and-water-maps/hydraulic-fracturing-water-stress-water-demand-by-the-numbers

http://ecowatch.com/2015/04/02/california-exempts-big-oil-big-ag/

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/29461-as-drought-deepens-california-sees-millions-of-gallons-of-water-used-for-fracking

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/04/06/3643184/california-70-million-gallons-fracking/

http://www.cleanwateraction.org/fracking-california

http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/editorials/article/Oil-waste-doesn-t-belong-in-California-s-6256472.php?cmpid=twitter-mobile

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/02/18/3624116/how-would-you-like-your-oil-spilled-today-sir/

http://www.propublica.org/article/pipelines-explained-how-safe-are-americas-2.5-million-miles-of-pipelines

http://insideclimatenews.org/news/06022015/yellowstone-oil-spills-expose-threat-pipelines-under-rivers-nationwide



US Water Shortage Info:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/04/20/why-obamas-trip-to-the-florida-everglades-is-a-shrewd-move-in-the-climate-debate/

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21494919/ns/us_news-environment/t/crisis-feared-us-water-supplies-dry/#.VUExVJOgs8B

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2012/02/07/texas-water-district-acts-to-slow-depletion-of-the-ogallala-aquifer/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-ogallala-aquifer/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/09/12/how-long-before-the-midwest-runs-out-of-water/

http://www.npr.org/2015/04/17/400377057/as-lake-mead-levels-drop-the-west-braces-for-bigger-drought-impact

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/11/141123-lake-powell-colorado-river-drought-water/

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/13/us/mighty-rio-grande-now-a-trickle-under-siege.html

http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/habitats/down-the-drain/

http://www.orlandoweekly.com/orlando/will-floridas-impending-water-crisis-be-addressed-by-state-legislature/Content?oid=2242828

http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/06/06/412297396/for-new-mexicos-chiles-the-enemy-isnt-just-drought-but-salt-too

http://www.npr.org/2015/05/13/406505133/santa-fe-cuts-water-consumption-by-imposing-tiered-pricing-model

International Water Shortage Info:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/world-vanishing-lakes-180949645/?no-ist

http://www.businessinsider.com/r-in-russia-a-drying-lake-threatens-an-era-of-water-wars-2015-3

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=85665

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/10/141001-aral-sea-shrinking-drought-water-environment/

http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2015/03/12/392323822/the-west-bank-battle-for-land-and-water

http://qz.com/353707/india-is-already-facing-a-water-crisis-and-it-is-only-going-to-get-worse/

http://thediplomat.com/2014/11/chinas-looming-water-shortage/ 

http://www.businessinsider.com/china-water-risk-2011-11#

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21620202-vast-new-waterways-will-not-solve-chinas-desperate-water-shortages-grand-new-canals

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/07/us-saudi-water-idUSTRE78642F20110907

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101967519

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/WCAS-D-13-00059.1

Deforestation and Drought:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-29956589

http://www.ibtimes.com/rampant-deforestation-amazon-jungle-may-be-cause-brazils-devastating-drought-1734146

https://www.ted.com/talks/antonio_donato_nobre_the_magic_of_the_amazon_a_river_that_flows_invisibly_all_around_us


Carbon dioxide Historic High:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2015/05/06/global-average-co2-skyrockets-past-significant-benchmark-noaa-says/


http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/05/06/carbon-dioxide-global-warming-climate-change/70881210/

http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2014/09/09/carbon-dioxide-level-united-nations/15324523/

Historic GDP's By State:

http://www.eia.gov/state/seds/sep_prices/notes/pr_GDP.pdf