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Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

latimes.com

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Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#111

Post by baxtr »

beambot wrote: post #28

Quick Google stats: There are 13M households in California. Average household consumes 0.5-1.0 acre-feet of water per year. It costs $419 per acre-foot for desalination. California has a discretionary budget surplus of $49B. Thus: It would cost $2.7B-$5.4B per year to provide desalination-based water to all Californians. With the current budget surplus, we could provide 100% of California's living water needs for 10-…

As others have noted, desalination cause enormous amounts of waste. So then, the next environmental topic needs to be addressed.

I believe there are other, better ways to handle limited water supplies like finding inefficacies in the system and plugging those holes. Changing from mass monocultures to perma-cultures.

Unfortunately, they are much more boring than desalination plants.

There are great videos on this on YT, like [1]. Go and check them out.

[1] https://youtu.be/W-f2genlUZI

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#112

Post by njarboe »

California does not approve of the building of desalination plants, unfortunately. A $1.4 billion dollar plan from a private company to build one in the L.A. basin was rejected in May of this year[1]. Private capital is available to help with this problem, but the people/government of California won't allow it.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/california-regulator-reject...

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#113

Post by joe_the_user »

mistrial9 wrote: post #7

Los Angeles area with 13 million inhabitants, is the economic powerhouse of California overall. Gov. Arnold S. famously had staff meetings in LA, less so in the official capital city of Sacramento (gold era). San Diego county is unique to the area as a border to Mexico. San Diego County is largely separate from the others with heavy Federal presence. The multi-county region including LA County there is known as SCAG…

80% of water use in California is agriculture. Even in residential use, ornamental agriculture and lawns are a huge part of the use.

If LA removes it's plants, it's ability to operate as a city should continue. It's California agriculture that's in trouble and California's archaic water rights laws make this worse.

Everything about the crises of today brings up the current memes - "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas" + "this is fine".

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#114

Post by kylehotchkiss »

tomc1985 wrote: post #27
Victerius wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The state needs to start overruling the local NIMBYs and build the desal plants the rest of the state needs. And the regulators need to chill out: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/california-regulator-reject...

San Diego got its desal plant in the husk of an old coal plant, and it has been the GREATEST thing. We are much closer to water independence than anyone else in the state and not having to listen about constant drought nagging has been FANTASTIC

strong agree! it comes out to just about 7% of the total water though doesn't it?

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#115

Post by nikanj »

BurningFrog wrote: post #68
s0rce wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree that we should build desalination, even if we can "afford" it. There are agricultural users of water paying astronomically lower prices due to long standing water rights. It would almost certainly be cheaper to pay them to conserve (grow less of water-wasting crops, leave fields fallow, or upgrade to more efficient drip irrigation). The urban water use is around 20%, making them pay billions for this 20% m…

Yeah, buying out the current water right owners and moving towards market prices on water seems like the best way to handle this. But that requires a government that can and wants to do things. I hope to be surprised, but I don't see California doing either of these things...

That requires a population that wants a government that does things. Not very popular in the US.

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#116

Post by fennecfoxen »

odiroot wrote: post #61
beambot wrote: post #28

Quick Google stats: There are 13M households in California. Average household consumes 0.5-1.0 acre-feet of water per year. It costs $419 per acre-foot for desalination. California has a discretionary budget surplus of $49B. Thus: It would cost $2.7B-$5.4B per year to provide desalination-based water to all Californians. With the current budget surplus, we could provide 100% of California's living water needs for 10-…

> acre-feet Being European, that's the weirdest unit of volume, I've ever seen.

Yes, metric is nice.

In the meantime, the acre is the standard unit of area for farms, fields, residential property, other property, parks, and certain other uses of land. A house on a quarter-acre lot generally has a backyard, and would fit in most suburbs. A house on a half-acre lot has a big backyard with plenty of room for your kids to run around. A full acre is getting pretty decently big — it's more like the size of a small field that you'd use for growing crops (which is the origin of the measure: 1 farmer-pair-of-oxen-plow-day.)

Rain is measured in inches and feet.

Just multiply two values people use in practice and get another that they can use in practice: acre-feet. Are you forecast for three inches (0.25 feet) of rain, on your forty-acre property? That's 10 acre-feet of water you can get from the sky instead of the irrigation authority. Like most things customary, it's easier to use in some ways, harder in others.

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#117

Post by sn0wf1re »

thehappypm wrote: post #59
yellowapple wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And that doesn't even begin to factor in the revenue opportunities from scaling up desalination further for export to neighboring states (most of which are even more arid than California). I've said it before and I'll say it again: California food and (desalinated) water in exchange for Nevada electricity (be it solar, geothermal, or nuclear) would mutually benefit both states and produce one hell of an economic jugg…

Pumping water from the California coast to Nevada is not a good idea. You’re basically describing a hydro plant, in reverse, carrying expensive water.

Parts of Nevada are below sea level so the total energy expenditure to move water should be "minimal". This would be after making aqueducts. My thinking is, if the Romans could move water over mountains without pipes, so too can the Americans.

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#118

Post by newman314 »

beambot wrote: post #28

Quick Google stats: There are 13M households in California. Average household consumes 0.5-1.0 acre-feet of water per year. It costs $419 per acre-foot for desalination. California has a discretionary budget surplus of $49B. Thus: It would cost $2.7B-$5.4B per year to provide desalination-based water to all Californians. With the current budget surplus, we could provide 100% of California's living water needs for 10-…

John Oliver just had a segment on water: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtxew5XUVbQ

In the episode, there's literally a farmer that says that he grows a water inefficient crop deliberately in order to hold on to water rights (@ 8:38). "Use it or lose it" water rights are ass backwards to put it mildly.

Make agriculture figure how to use less water or face penalties. That's the way forward.

Re: Extreme heat, drought will permanently scar California and its social fabric

#120

Post by MAGZine »

noah_buddy wrote: post #74
chriscjcj wrote: post #35

In this California native and resident's opinion, California's "social fabric" has been deteriorating for a long, long time. Just add this to a long list of problems this state is completely incapable of mitigating.

I grew up in California and I’ve seen just about everything from my youth turn over in the last ten years from tech transplants and TikTok stars. My old neighborhood is now majority yuppies in condos. Money is a destructive and constructive force, California has made the deal with the devil.

california has always been a place of immigration and gold seekers.

san francisco was literally a goldrush city and a port. it was always a place of money and economy.

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