A Kingdom from Dust (2018) • Hacker News Board

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#111

Post by nine_k » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:12 AM UTC

manigandham wrote: post #96

ebcode wrote: post #57

It's interesting to think of the state of California as one ginormous mining-town. Only instead of some rare mineral that will one day be exhausted, it's the groundwater in the aquifer that underlies the entire valley. The concept of virtual water may help us to treat this vital resource with more care. I'm imagining something like a nutrition label, where there's an estimate of how many liters/gallons of water is ne…

People do not change their behavior until forced to by a major situation. Some labels aren't going to change anything.

Price labels likely will.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#112

Post by whatshisface » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:14 AM UTC

wahern wrote: post #108

lazyasciiart wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The normal way to do this is to charge for the ingredient at source. It seems easier to change the California laws (constitution?) so that agriculture pays per gallon of water.

I don't know the specifics in California but property rights in water are complex, especially in the Western U.S. A mere change in regulations, even under a state constitution, might constitute a regulatory taking (i.e. a taking of property requiring just compensation under the 5th Amendment). Because the issues are so complex, the legal terrain so unclear, and the consequences of an adverse court ruling so substanti…

Water laws are loose because they were written in a world where groundwater is almost as plentiful as air. Locations where this is still true should keep their simple laws (nobody wants a trillion detailed laws if there is no need), but places like California need to get more sophisticated.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#113

Post by thaumasiotes » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:14 AM UTC

F_r_k wrote: post #83

thaumasiotes wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there's really only so long you can make an aqueduct This doesn't make any sense. Oil pipelines cross continents.

Good luck watering your fields with a 1m diam pipeline...

I would suggest two 1m diameter pipelines, but I feel like one 1.4m diameter pipeline would be even cheaper.

There's no limit on how long you can make an aqueduct. We don't have long aqueducts because water isn't very valuable.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#114

Post by dwd » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:15 AM UTC

thomasjudge wrote: post #104

dwd wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fiji for example? Vox recently covered the history of their Fiji Water brand. https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/1/7/18171384/fiji-water-gir...

...owned by the Wonderful company, the same company that is the subject of the article...

They seem to believe there's a market at a particular price point for shipping water halfway around the world.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#115

Post by manigandham » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:29 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #111

manigandham wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do not change their behavior until forced to by a major situation. Some labels aren't going to change anything.

Price labels likely will.

As in changing the actual price? Sure, but that seems different from add more info to the label.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#116

Post by jelliclesfarm » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 4:51 AM UTC

https://vimeo.com/301508642 : A documentary on Pistachio Wars ... this story is well known and everyone from politicians in Sacramento and DC to Big Ag is complicit.

All the nuts exported during our ‘drought’ was really California Water that was being exported and that tax payers fund through bond measures every election.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#117

Post by BurningFrog » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:05 AM UTC

dodobirdlord wrote: post #78

BurningFrog wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or people will have the city of LA in a more sensible region.

Urban water usage is a rounding error compared to industrial and agricultural water usage. It will always make more economic sense to move water to cities than to move cities to water. The same is not true for agriculture and industry, and the two topics don't belong in the same discussion.

The economics of moving water aside, this argument assumes industry doesn't need cities.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#118

Post by labster » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:14 AM UTC

pm90 wrote: post #53

> One day water will be more valuable than oil, and like oil it will start wars. Is this true? Its true that natural sources of water might be scant, but what happens if we just build huge desal plants all along the CA coast and pipe in the water? And what if those desal plants are powered by cheap renewable energy?

Of course it's true, water scarcity has caused wars from the Late Bronze Age Collapse all the way to modern Syria. Other regions of the world too, like in the Mayan civ.

You get it though, solving energy problems solves all of the water problems. You still have environmental issues from the desalination plants, like where to put the hypersaline water without killing all the fish. But I'd love to see desal using peak capacity of renewables.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#119

Post by cratermoon » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:19 AM UTC

AngryData wrote: post #8

It is all fun and games until the last drop of water gets sucked up. Then they will (already are in some cases) bitch and complain that other states don't pipeline then hundreds of millions of gallons of water while disparaging those same states for not following the same short-sighted and unsustainable practices.

California has long talked about draining Oregon's Klamath River basin, and even taking water from the Columbia via Vancouver B.C.

Re: A Kingdom from Dust (2018)

#120

Post by cratermoon » Mon, Feb 04, 2019, 5:21 AM UTC

pm90 wrote: post #53

> One day water will be more valuable than oil, and like oil it will start wars. Is this true? Its true that natural sources of water might be scant, but what happens if we just build huge desal plants all along the CA coast and pipe in the water? And what if those desal plants are powered by cheap renewable energy?

It's already happened and is still happening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_water_wars