California Fights Drought With Data and Psychology, Yielding 5% Usage Reduction 362
dcblogs writes with an article about hackers using technology to mitigate the effects of drought. From the article: "California is facing its worst drought in more than 100 years, and one with no end in sight. But it is offering Silicon Valley opportunities. In one project, the East Bay Municipal Utility District in Oakland used customized usage reports .... that [compare] a customer's water use against average use for similar sized households. It uses a form of peer pressure to change behavior. A ... year-long pilot showed a 5% reduction in water usage. The utility said the reporting system could 'go a long way' toward helping the state meet its goal of a reducing water usage by 20% per capita statewide. In other tech related activities, the organizer of a water-tech focused hackathon, Hack the Drought is hoping this effort leads to new water conserving approaches. Overall, water tech supporters are working to bring more investor attention to this market. Imagine H2O, a non-profit, holds annual water tech contests and then helps with access to venture funding. The effort is focused on 'trying to address the market failure in the water sector,' Scott Bryan, the chief operating officer of Imagine H2O."
compare water usage with "average"? (Score:3, Insightful)
So, how long before they start redefining "average" down below the actual average so as to make even more people feel bad about themselves?
After all, it's pretty much just a line of code to reduce the value displayed under "average use" to be, well, whatever the coder wants it to be.
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Since average, and the way to calculate it are defined in the industry, changing it arbitrarily will be noticed.
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Who's going to notice? Are the numbers available such that an interested person could verify the computation of the average?
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The industry takes the very seriously. You can bet people will point it out very quickly. I spent 8 years working with engineers and experts in that field. Like most trades, they like accuracy and professionalism with the engineers.
Re:Did you read the ATL? (Score:4, Interesting)
You have a point, but you're a long way from cutting into actual need.
I live in a country where everybody has access to high quality ground water. Our avarage daily water consumption is per capita less than a third of that of a the US, where you don't have access to high quality water. (our tap water is cleaner than bottled water.)
I was shocked by the disregard for water the first time I visited the US. Just as an example, your toilet bowls are huge lakes of water compared to what I'm used to. Flushing all that water just made me feel guilty.
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Reduce usage - pay more (Score:5, Interesting)
In Denver we suffered through a drought that lasted a few years. There was a big campaign to get people to reduce their water usage - and it worked! People significantly reduced their water usage - so much that the water board was no longer getting the revenue that it said it needed. So, the rates went up.
Funny how the rates didn't go back down when the drought was over.
Also, not surprisingly, the golf courses got all the water they wanted.
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That's a classic conundrum in the industry.
Are you sure yo aren't in a drought? A drought simple means you have less water then demand.
More accurately, current demand will lower you water storage below a certain point. So if your population grows, you could get to a point where demand outstrips even a wet year.
Also, the may be using the money to fund work, like underground tanks.
I will assume you sewage is part of your water bill. They may have a large project that needs funding and your 'water bill' goes u
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Ah, but Golf Courses are the red herring of California. It's what farmers, who are wasting massive amounts of water, like to point and scream at, to distract from the real issue - people growing shit where they have no business whatsoever growing shit. (And then shipping it to China. But that's another matter entirely.)
Meanwhile, neither golf courses or farmers will be penalized - nay, households will be put to the sword if they don't wring the drippings out of their laundry and drink them.
Amusing captc
Re:Reduce usage - pay more (Score:5, Informative)
Yes 85% of water usage in California is Agriculture.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
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--
.nosig
Re:Reduce usage - pay more (Score:5, Interesting)
That and 90 billion gallons of water in Alfalfa sent to China, and 97 billion gallons
used for fracking...
Also I hear the commercial water rate is lower then the residential rate, ie.
the per gallon price is cheaper for the corporates then for the sheeple.
So basically the citizens are paying corporate welfare to big AgriBiz.
Re:Reduce usage - pay more (Score:5, Interesting)
Farmers in California grow a lot of rice which requires a lot of water. Most places that grow rice have lots of water. In California, even in "normal" years, there is no rain in the summer (dry season) so they have extensive dams and canals paid for by state and federal taxpayers which provide them lots of cheap water.
This year, there is a drought so the reservoirs are dry and the farmers are whinging seriously about "their" water.
California has lots of water for people... not so much to grow rice in the desert.
(Same argument applies to most California farming which uses an unsustainable amount of water to grow food in a desert.)
Re:Reduce usage - pay more (Score:4, Insightful)
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Desalination has its own problems. Currently it is ridiculously expensive because it uses enormous amounts of energy. It's practical on ships because they only need to make relatively little water. The FIRST step should be conserve and recycle water, this is much cheaper and more practical. Otherwise what happens when a water shortage coincides with an energy shortage?
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There also seems to be a severe lack of common sense farming tactic of rotating crops. Ie, they grew rice last year, therefore they feel that the must grow rice this year.
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If you're looking at yearly average precipitation, you won't get the real picture. Most of California's precipitation falls during the winter in the mountains as snow. It doesn't rain during the summer rice growing season (hence my calling it a desert... at least in the summer). Most years, the rice is irrigated by melting snow.
Sacramento Valley gets about 3 inches a rain a month from November through March and that drops to near zero through the Summer months.
The Sacramento Valley is the primary rice growi
Farmers wasting large amounts of water (Score:3)
How are farmers wasting massive amounts of water? Do you know anything about food production and agricultural water use in general? American farmers do export a lot of food, but your food prices are low because of the wealth of food grown right in your backyard. Where are farmers growing food where they shouldn't be? Do you have an alternative? In many places, the best farmland is under cities now, perhaps pushing farmer to more marginal lands. This is an unfortunate consequence of growth. Granted.
Farm
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Re:compare water usage with "average"? (Score:5, Informative)
The CA home user uses about 10% of the water, the other 90% is used by Agriculture and Industry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
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The only meaningful comparison would be sustainable water usage.
People may realize one day that it isn't a good idea to build huge cities, swimming pools, golf courses and water shows in the friggin desert.
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The advantage of using an honest average is that as the households with the highest usage lower their water use, the average goes down on its own. This assumes that anyone already below the average line has their own reasons and will not respond to the data in an unexpected manner.
Saving the most water could become a pissing contest ... oh wait!
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I use the power and water levels I do, because I want to, and the serve my purposes in life, and I can afford to pay the levels I do.
I can't imagine myself lowering (or raising) my usage levels at all based on those others around me..??
Do people seriously keep up with the Joneses that much this day in age in everything?
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it costs 10 bucks for a shower head (and 3-5 for plumber's tape if you don't have any)
WTF? What kind of gold-plated plumber's tape are you using?
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I think he meant, for a whole roll of plumber's tape.
Me too. Try 50 - 60 cents. For like 40 FEET.
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You're right, we should let the free market sort it out. That way the water manufacturers will receive incentive to build more waters when the price of water rises to the level the oil companies are willing to pay to pump it into the ground to get $110 barrels of oil out.
Enjoy your bath at bottled-water prices.
I have a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I have a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Queue the late great Sam Kinison:
You want to help world hunger? Stop sending them food. Don't send them another bite, send them U-Hauls. Send them a guy that says, "You know, we've been coming here giving you food for about 35 years now and we were driving through the desert, and we realized there wouldn't BE world hunger if you people would live where the FOOD IS! YOU LIVE IN A DESERT!! UNDERSTAND THAT? YOU LIVE IN A FUCKING DESERT!! NOTHING GROWS HERE! NOTHING'S GONNA GROW HERE! Come here, you see this? This is sand. You know what it's gonna be 100 years from now? IT'S GONNA BE SAND!! YOU LIVE IN A FUCKING DESERT! We have deserts in America, we just don't live in them, assholes!"
Manufactured Crisis (Score:5, Funny)
so a group of peope had the brilliant idea of building massive cities and huge agricultural farmlands in a desert, made possible by unsustainable draining of acquifers and importation of water from other states.
and now they have a "drought"?
can't raise enough moisture for a tear over here....
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So you're against watering crops then?
If you have good land, but it lacks water, then you find a way to add water, and then you can grow food there. Useless land becomes valuable and people can eat. You are apparently against this. Why?
Re:Manufactured Crisis (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm against watering a barren blazing desert in the west trying to pretend its "farmland"
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There's no need to pretend. It's a farm when you water crops. It's not a farm when you don't.
Are you against planting crops too?
Re:Manufactured Crisis (Score:4, Insightful)
water levels in the aquifers are down 15 to 50 feet since year 2000, not being replenished as the absurd amounts of water on the pretend "farmland" and the too-huge cities are leading to the inevitable conclusion
Re:Manufactured Crisis (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, irrigation systems help create farmland from land that was not previously suitable for farming, but there is lots more farmland out there that doesn't need irrigation than that does. Here in the midwest, farmers will often use irrigation systems but it is to prevent their crops from dying due to drought and generally is not intended to turn bad soil into good soil (although this does happen as well). It's a method of regulating water supply, not a way of terraforming.
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There aren't a lot of farms in Los Angels, and not all of Ca was desert.
How is producing almost all the tomotoes used 'pretending' to be farmland?
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If you have good land, but it lacks water, then you find a way to add water, and then you can grow food there.
Like rice in the Sacramento Valley? Yeah, that makes sense in a semi-arid area.
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If you have good land, but it lacks water, then you find a way to add water, and then you can grow food there.
Please define "good" as it pertains to land and growing food. Because I would think that lacking water is a pretty big impediment for good farmland.
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If you can get water, then you're taking water away from someone else, leveraging your farm's well being on the hope that whomever your getting water from will always have a surplus and always have methods to transport that surplus to you.
"The guy who decides" has clearly made a poor choice, as demonstrated by the article. If farming in the desert was viable, we wouldn't be running articles about this drought issue.
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And if I take a tonne of gold and bury it in the ground, did I make a mine? Sure, I guess, but most people would call you crazy if you actually did that. It may be "farmland", but it's not good farmland (by and large, some areas of California are different, and some crops work very well in drier weather), especially when you're wasting massive amounts of water even on a good year.
Re:Manufactured Crisis - Oblig (Score:4, Funny)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v... [youtube.com]
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Actually per the wiki on California water most of the groundwater is not being used because it requires
energy to pump it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
I think they could setup solar thermal powered pumps.
Also the rights to the ground water are totally available to the farmer.
This is more about cheap water, then the totality of water.
There is enough groundwater to do what they need, but they will need to
mind recharge rates if they switch to a major pumping operation or they
end up like the Oolagah Aquifer
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In truth this is a 1 out of 100 year drought. It most certainly is not manufactured as it has not rain yet in southern California and the rainy season is almost DONE.
But to answer your post on why? The answer is easy. RAISE PRICES! Raise them high enough and then you can afford to pump them out with disiel powered pumps too. Keep in mind you can't just get the water out of the ground overnight.
You need to have infrastructure to move it, rights, plenty of capital while you wait to get paid, etc. These things
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I was thinking the same thing a couple weeks ago: People had the brilliant idea of building massive cities far up north, where ice storms and freezing cold weather is routine, and now they have shortages of natural gas, road salt, power outages due to trees taking down
flow = pressure/resistance (Score:3, Interesting)
Why not simply lower the water pressure by 10% to curb water usage?
Re:flow = pressure/resistance (Score:4, Insightful)
Why not simply lower the water pressure by 10% to curb water usage?
That might be practical but it depends on geography. You might find that people in low-lying areas need a high pressure just to that the water reaches the houses on the top of the hill. Also it depends on usage - someone with a conventional shower may save water when pressure is reduced, but someone who takes a bath or had a power shower probably won't.
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Stop taking baths. Shower.
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Might work for showers, but not for people filling bathtubs and washing machines.
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85+% of water is used for Agriculture and Industry.
The majority of California water is used by the agricultural industry. About 80-85% of all developed water in California is used for agricultural purposes. This water irrigates almost 29 million acres (120,000 km2), which grows 350 different crops.[8] Urban users consume 10% of the water, or around 8,700,000 acre feet (10.7 km3).[9] Industry receives the remnant of the water supply.[10]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
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Why not find a way to supply the water people need? Why shouldn't everyone who is willing to pay the transportation costs be able to use as much water as they want?
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Why not find a way to supply the water people need? Why shouldn't everyone who is willing to pay the transportation costs be able to use as much water as they want?
Because politics. Farmers want 80% of California's water.
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Lots of people want lots of things. So what?
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Good Point, one idea is a aqueduct/canal/pipeline from the Columbia River which has a discharge rate FAR beyond
all the other California aqueducts combined.
I'd say bring it down the coast at a flat elevation thus near zero energy requirements.
Would be a good project to put ppl back to work much like the CCC of the last Great Recession...
Re:flow = pressure/resistance (Score:4, Insightful)
Because building plumbing is built on the assumption that street water pressure levels are a certain figure. Decrease the water pressure and you find you have a lot of buildings in which the top floor doesn't get less water--it gets *no* water.
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Only 10% of the water used in California is home users, 85% is Agriculture, 5% is Industry.
Home users are not the issue here, much like politics and wall street, greed is the issue.
There is no drought in California. (Score:4, Insightful)
There is merely a shortage of raw materials (H2O) for big agriculture.
Agriculture consumes 80% of the water in California and contributes 5% of the economy. There is sufficient water in California to supply the cities 5 times over.
But before you fly-over states get all self-righteous, think about this the next time you buy fresh salad greens in January.
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"There is merely a shortage of raw materials (H2O) for big agriculture."
that's the definition of drought. Not enough water for your needs.
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think about this the next time you buy fresh salad greens in January
Or the next time I get rice grown in the Sacramento valley - the perfect crop for a near desert.
BTW, were you under the impression that CA and the Southwest are the only places that are warm in the winter and within easy reach of CONUS? Please check your map. The whole thing, including so-called "water rights", is a big subsidy to farmers, who also yell for cheaper labor because, bottom line, they wouldn't be competitive without these subsidies. Want to ship all our industry to China? No problem - just save
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But before you fly-over states get all self-righteous, think about this the next time you buy fresh salad greens in January.
I only buy moles' asses in January. I don't ask why the moles raise livestock, but they sell the stupid ones for extra cheap (which is great because they're less stubborn).
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This [accuweather.com] says something different. 2013 was the driest year on record. I think that meets the definition of drought.
Was it really the usage reports? (Score:3)
Did the usage reports really result in a 5% drop in water usage, or is it the fact that for the past 4 months, you can't watch the news without hearing all about the drought conditions and how people have to stop flushing their toilets so much. Meanwhile, residential use accounts for only 10 - 15% of California's water use, so even if everyone cut their use by 20%, it really wouldn't solve the problem.
Residential use is a drop in the bucket (Score:3, Informative)
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Yeah the farmers need to shift to a water wicking method or something similar.
The high evaporation rates is what is using up a lot of the water.
http://0.tqn.com/d/gardening/1... [tqn.com]
Meanwhile, in Toronto... (Score:3)
Water saving measures have drained funds from water taxes that are used to maintain the infrastructure...
http://www.theglobeandmail.com... [theglobeandmail.com]
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Right. Save a couple billion on expanded water treatment facilities but you need a little extra per litre to cover the pipe maintenance.
It's not a net loss.
Re:Meanwhile, in Toronto... (Score:5, Interesting)
Water saving measures have drained funds from water taxes that are used to maintain the infrastructure...
http://www.theglobeandmail.com... [theglobeandmail.com]
The smarter towns do what many other (often private) utilities do - have a line item for "fixed costs" and another for "usage". You get a fixed charge of $10-20 for access to the utility, and then a per watt-liter-whatever charge for usage. Even if you use NOTHING, that flat cost comes in every month.
Water billing is largely done on a city/village/town basis. Often, the water comes from a common-source (county 'water agency') which passes on costs to the smaller towns feeding off of it.
Now: if someone along the way mismanages it [dgreport.com], that's a different problem.
A drop in a bucket. (Score:5, Interesting)
Meanwhile billions of gallons of water from California are, essentially, being exported to China [wsj.com].
NB: I apologize if the article is paywalled. The first look is free.
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MOD PARENT UP, also around 97 billion gallons went to fracking.
http://www.salon.com/2014/02/0... [salon.com]
Raise PRICES (Score:2)
I do not understand why politicians wont do this. Raise the rates 400% and water usage will drop and in the end a true crises of NO WATER by the summer will be avoided.
The laws of supply and demand benefit everyone even including the consumer. Why don't the left wing politicians see this? It benefits the consumer as Lake Mead wont dry up totally.
When next winter when the snow and rain returns then you lower prices or keep them high while the reservoirs recover. ... oh heck who am I kidding. The top 3 big fa
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You'd have to make a progressive pricing system if they don't have it already: basic usage (what an average family would need for cooking, drinking, and hygiene) is very cheap, a band of usage above that costing more per unit, the next band of usage costing quite a bit more per unit, and so on, about how income taxes are figured.
You'd also want to promote xeriscaping and using graywater for your plants and toilets.
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Charging residents more per gallon then the farmers is a subsidy paid to the farmers.
When the citizen serfs have to pony up huge money so that farmers can get cheap water
to ship Alfalfa to China for fat profits that is fascism.
The farmers need to be paying the same rate as the citizen serfs and this problem would
go away, and the farmers would then find all that groundwater cheap to pump in comparison.
This is merely corporate welfare for corporate farms.
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Lake Mead is current at 48% of full pool.
One might say its average movement is toward empty, not towards full.
I think most of the desert cities could do better with conservation, such
as lawns, pools, farming, etc.
A few states are drawing off Lake Mead.
Have the golf courses been shut down? (Score:3)
"...each course each day in Palm Springs consumes as much water as an American family of four uses in four years. "
http://www.npr.org/templates/s... [npr.org]
"Market Failure" ? Pshaw. This is not complicated (Score:3)
The problem is not a "market failure", it is that the market is distorted. If the true laws of supply and demand were allowed to work on the water market in California, then water would be a lot more expensive right now because of how rare it is due to drought.
If the people are using too much water then raise the price. Define what consitutes a "drought" in strict terms (average rainfall below some amount for X days in a row), and raise the price per gallon of water an extra 50% during these drought conditions. Add in a credit for people below the poverty line so that they don't have issues.
Usage problems will be solved overnight. Charge people more and they will use less. Wallet pressure works a lot better than "peer pressure".
They just need to.... (Score:5, Interesting)
They just need to do what they've done in other western "dry" states and price water on consumption. In my state I pay a normal about $30 a month for the first 7000 gallons, which is enough for most moderately sized households internal uses. But the next 7000 gallons cost me double the $30 and the third set of 7000 costs me triple. In the summer my water bill goes from $30 a month to almost $300. This progressive pricing was introduced during our last big drought and water consumption went down 20% almost immediately and has continued to drop every year. Xeroscaping became very popular.
In fact I'm in the process of ripping up several hundred feet of sod to be replaced with native plants.
Re:They just need to.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Utah. We had a nearly 7 year drought with sub 50% snowfall every year. Near the end of that drought all the reservoirs in the mountains that provide the summer water were damn near empty. The progressive pricing was instituted county wide and has continued since along with some of the extra money being spent on water use reduction public campaigns such as http://www.slowtheflow.org/ [slowtheflow.org].
They also setup several community demonstration gardens with various native and non-native plant life to show people how to plant attractive yards that consume significantly less water which are the water conservation gardens link on the page I linked above.
Phoenix is actually one of the places I believe within the next decade is going to have an eye opening event with water. Las Vegas is currently in the throws of theirs, Utah did it in the late 90's early 00's. Rainfall patterns are changing and the new Colorado river pact is going to dramatically change water allocation for Phoenix at some point in the future (probably the very near future) and you don't have the advantage Utah does (if we don't use our water in ends up in the evaporating toxic waste pit called the great salt lake which means there is no reason not to use every drop). If I was you I would be actively campaigning for increased water rates and water use reduction plans because if you don't put them place in before the catastrophe when it is forced on you it's going to be very costly.
Most Phoenix dwellers aren't aware of this but the vast majority of the water Phoenix uses comes from the Colorado River and it's pumped 6000 feet over the mountains using the power from Glen Canyon dam which is nearing it's life expectancy (it's about silted up). At some point in the future the Colorado River allocation is going to change drastically and at some point in the future the Glen Canyon dam is likely to go away. So not only will the water allocation go down you will have to start paying money to pump it over the mountains (the government currently pumps it for free).
OT: thanks, Websense! (Score:3)
That link to 'hackthedrought.org' is blocked because "Suspicious Content. Sites in this category may pose a security threat to network resources or private information, and are blocked by your organization."
Teach them to put the word " |-| @ C | " into their URL! Nasty terrorists!
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The real use is farming for out-of-state sales. Industry is second. Home use is a grotesquely distant and minor third.
Getting the home user panicked and guilty and whipped up was a knowing, admitted strategy to try to get legislation passed. Mathematically pointless limit discs are part of this.
Save a few percent -- put off the need for growth a year or two.
Ya wanna do something useful? Make it legal for people who develop alternate sources to preen and waste water luxuriously, sans limit discs and with
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Nope, at cost +- 1%
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You didn't use the most water, you recycled the most water! I mean, you weren't breaking it down to hydrogen and oxygen, were you? Or hoarding it? No, you applied it for its intended purpose, and then gave it right back.
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No, it's used. In that it's not longer usable. i.e. not potable.
By you definition, nothing is ever used.
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I know. It's used, the its' unusable, then it's processed and then it's used again.
Hence, used. i.e. not potable.
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Yeah alot of ppl don't realize that residential use inside the home goes to the water treatment plant,
then back into the system. Things like lawn watering need to end though, its not practical.
Pool covers need to be made mandatory.
The top usage of water in California is agriculture, and a large portion of it is lost due to evaporation.
If they used a water method similar to wicking, they'd get much lower evaporation rates.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
Myself and others have said a water pipeline from the
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The desalination system, would need to be rebuilt. Their current state isn't very good.
"Also a large amount of groundwater is available"
sadly, much of it's isn't practically available.
Re:Contest (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you think everyone should dig up all the grass and use astro turf?
Actually in a lot of New Mexico (can't speak for elsewhere), digging under your grass and "zeroscaping" is fairly popular. Looks good and takes almost no water. Of course, you might need grass out back if you want to play on your Slip-n-Slide.
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...digging under your grass and "zeroscaping" is fairly popular.
Xeriscaping [wikipedia.org]. Sounds about the same, though.
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Like when someone brings a breathalyzer to a party. You'd think reasonable people would make sure they didn't drink too much. Nope. It becomes a contest to see who can blow the highest reading.
Hey Californians. I live on the other coast and I have a hole in my back yard where I can pump all the water out I could ever want - for free.
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Another step towards third water nation status. Just make it too expensive and let people live in squalar.
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Market drive water fails. I mean, it makes money, but you end up with more squallier.
Which is fine if you plan is to drive the country into 3rd world status.
It's not like you can have competing markets with a water system.
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It's simple math: Total Resources Available = Resource Consumption Rate x Number of People
What's the best way to control this? Cost. Remove all the subsidies beyond a minimum X gallons per person. Let people and markets drive the rest.
"Corporations are people, my friend"
So now on top of everything else farmers will have to buy and administer hundreds of shell companies to get enough water to keep going.
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The funny thing is they could use a sand filter to 100% stop the fish being killed
and transfer the water thru the sand into the system.
Sand filter is old tech and requires zero power.
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yes but anything that
1 solves the problem permanently
2 does not generate campaign dollars
3 is cheap
4 does not have a PAC bribing behind it
5 is simple to implement
6 can't be used to generate kickbacks for "Friends"
is a non starter in this government
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CA is suffering a lack of water because billions of gallons of fresh water have been dumped into the ocean in order to supposedly "save" an insignificant fish.
Latino immigrants vote Dem to get gov handouts which keep Dems in power. Dems in power cater to extremists in their own party resulting in CA's drought and CA's brainwashing of kindergarteners with the radical politics of alternative sexual lifestyles. CA is in bad shape now, but it is going to be one truly f***ed up place in 20 years.
You must be a farmer -- "screw the insignificant fish because I want to grow crops in the desert". Since the largest employer of Latino immigrants is agriculture, you'd think that if dems were giving latinos what they want, they'd give the farmers more water.
If you think CA is brainwashing kids with radical politics of alternative sexual lifestyles, you really ought to look around, it turns our that homosexuals have always been living among us, but are just now feeling comfortable coming out. When an NFL pl
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First, are you in the area effected by the drought?
Second, are you in an area that is very cold without snow?
Third, the pipes are not always 14' below ground. Your house is probably above ground so there must me a pipe that goes from 14' below ground to at least ground level to get to your house. I bet if you go outside you will find a shut off valve between the water main and your house. I doubt very much that the valve is 14' below ground level. It is that section that might freeze.
Re:Here in WI we're required to keep a running fau (Score:5, Insightful)
Tell me more about global warming, please.
Sure thing. [xkcd.com]
It's NOT about water going in! (Score:3)
Fact: The cost of water is TINY even when it is scarce because it's a socialized resource. Bringing in water great distances can be costly initially unless done really poorly it eventually ends up cheap.
The REAL cost of water that you really pay for is the SEWAGE cost. SEWAGE processing is some expensive shit. ;-) They couldn't measure sewage but they could measure the water they also run into your house; also done by the city. Every place that doubled the two services up (almost everywhere with city water