The fight against drought in California has a new tool: The restrictor

Post by grandinj » Sun, Aug 28, 2022, 6:50 PM UTC

CitrusFruits wrote: post #16

twblalock wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agriculture is also a small portion of the state’s GDP and we could do without some of the most water-intensive crops, such as almonds. There won’t be food insecurity or famine if we cut back on almonds.

I talk with my friend who works in water law a lot about this, and he always comes to basically the same conclusion as this. Almonds and pistachios are a huge waste of water. The problem is that farmer's water rights are constitutionally protected (California constitution). You need a super majority in the California senate to do anything about it, and that's not going to happen anytime soon. IMO I think we should ta…

Post by lostdog » Sun, Aug 28, 2022, 6:55 PM UTC

RosanaAnaDana wrote: post #31

avalys wrote: post #4

The obvious solution here is to have a tiered pricing system for water, where the price per gallon increases with consumption. Increase the price of the higher tiers and/or rate of increase until consumption drops to level you need. And then you don’t need to pay government employees to drive around and inspect celebrity lawns all day.

I've done worked with or developed outdoor water use models for almost all water districts in the state of California. The issues cited in the article are a direct consequence of tiered rates. Districts become disinsentivised to reduce the water use for their highest using customers because thats where they make the most revenue. They need to show water use savings in gallons, but they make far more from high using c…

Post by tomjakubowski » Sun, Aug 28, 2022, 7:00 PM UTC

fmajid wrote: post #60

CitrusFruits wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I talk with my friend who works in water law a lot about this, and he always comes to basically the same conclusion as this. Almonds and pistachios are a huge waste of water. The problem is that farmer's water rights are constitutionally protected (California constitution). You need a super majority in the California senate to do anything about it, and that's not going to happen anytime soon. IMO I think we should ta…

Pistachios are a high-value crop, and other places under drought like the La Mancha region of Spain are also switching from olives and wheat to pistachios. Compare this to alfalfa, an ultra-low-value crop the Saudis are growing in California because they bought senior water rights, then shipping to Saudi to feed cows, essentially laundering water. Agricultural water is heavily subsidized in California, and the absurd…

Post by amluto » Sun, Aug 28, 2022, 7:06 PM UTC

Post by greedo » Sun, Aug 28, 2022, 7:07 PM UTC

dehrmann wrote: post #57

twblalock wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the sacrifice should be shared by all water users, and homeowners are far from the primary consumers of water. When agriculture uses most of the water, and the most water in agriculture goes to luxury foods like almonds and pistachios, it’s ridiculous to be investigating homeowners while not asking farmers to reduce consumption.

> luxury foods like almonds and pistachios "Luxury foods" oversells them a bit. The retail price per pound is close to ground beef.