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California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

drought.ca.gov

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Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#91

Post by mkl »

RayVR wrote: post #60
thisNeeds2BeSad wrote: post #13

The irony being that israel has "solved" water problems in agriculture largely, by reusing waste water and drip irrigation and simply have the users pay for that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in... This sounds like a typical US thing. Suffering from a solveable problem, while creating the maximum public drama and having the society incapable of reform as a sort of greek-tragedy-background…

While your criticism of the US _feels_ on point, I don't think it's really valid. Are you an agriculture expert or some sort of scientist with specialty knowledge? Some super quick research: * Israel has fewer than 10 million people. California has just under 40 million (4x) * Israel Agriculture exports $2B. California $20B (10x) * California has extensive regulations around water, including the use of recycled water…

Another comparison to consider: California is 20 times bigger than Israel.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#92

Post by mdavis6890 »

kolanos wrote: post #81
rmah wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, but the water in California is cheap and plentiful. Sustainably sourced, I don't know. But the root of the problem is that farmers do not pay a "fair" price, they get steep steep discounts. All the lawn watering, all the toilet flushes, all the swimming pools, etc. all amount to around 10% of water use in California. And those people already pay, on average, many multiples of what farmers pay per gallon.

This might just be me, but I prioritize agriculture over swimming pools. It's strange that it is agriculture to blame when LA doesn't source its own water and instead diverts water from the central valleys away from agriculture. Agriculture doesn't "pay their fair share", yet LA is actively taking water away from agriculture and also draining 5-7 year reservoirs. When wild fires are in full swing we're going to reall…

The point is that if you add up ALL the swimming pools in California, it totals ~0 water. Not even a rounding error. Farmers measure water use in MILLIONS of ACRE FEET. There is even an acronym for it: MAF.

There are rice paddies surrounding the capital city of Sacramento.

Why do we keep asking residents to sacrifice for even trivial pleasurers like swimming, when it makes no difference at all?

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#93

Post by nradov »

KSteffensen wrote: post #86
throwaway0a5e wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it is. Try and think a couple steps ahead. The system we live under only works because people believe in it and more or less voluntarily play by the rules. Feel free to undermine state legitimacy but know that this will result in more entities (and it will be the more powerful ones first, BigCo, city governments, etc) thumbing their nose at the state and engaging in short sighted behavior. If CA isn't gonna honor…

The solid legal foundation needs to take physical reality into account. Sure, if previous legal agreements did not account for reality, somebody needs to own up to that, cancel the previous agreements openly while sucking up the relevant penalties. However, if this doesn't happen, physical reality will eventually assert itself over legal agreements.

Yes and those issues will have to be worked out in the state legislature. This is a complex political process with many conflicting stakeholders. Regardless of the physical reality, the political reality will take time to change. We don't live in a dictatorship where policies can change on a whim.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#94

Post by toomuchtodo »

mdavis6890 wrote: post #92
kolanos wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might just be me, but I prioritize agriculture over swimming pools. It's strange that it is agriculture to blame when LA doesn't source its own water and instead diverts water from the central valleys away from agriculture. Agriculture doesn't "pay their fair share", yet LA is actively taking water away from agriculture and also draining 5-7 year reservoirs. When wild fires are in full swing we're going to reall…

The point is that if you add up ALL the swimming pools in California, it totals ~0 water. Not even a rounding error. Farmers measure water use in MILLIONS of ACRE FEET. There is even an acronym for it: MAF. There are rice paddies surrounding the capital city of Sacramento. Why do we keep asking residents to sacrifice for even trivial pleasurers like swimming, when it makes no difference at all?

No political will to force ag and industrial water users to curtail usage to sustainable (less than aquifer replenishment rate) levels.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#95

Post by mdavis6890 »

The best plan for CA to get their water under control is:

1. Fix agriculture water rights to numerical limits, somewhat higher than what is already being used. This will cap water usage and move away from an all-you-can-drink model, but not penalize existing farmers.

2. Buy back those water rights from farmers using a reverse-auction, allowing the farmers who generate the least value from their water to sell it back to the state.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#96

Post by scruple »

wudangmonk wrote: post #5

What is the tactic here? we know the cause is agriculture and blaming grass lawns and car washing can easily be disproven by a quick superficial google search. Pitting people against each other by being water snitches may work unless any actual restrictions are placed. As soon as any restrictions are placed, the whole show gets exposed. So...what is the whole point of the show in the first place?.

The show is to distract us from the fact that Sacramento doesn't have a solution to this problem.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#97

Post by mdavis6890 »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #55
orlp wrote: post #2

"Californians are being asked to reduce their water use by 15 percent over 2020 levels to protect water reserves and help maintain critical flows for fish and wildlife wherever possible." And by that they surely mean agriculture, right? Right? The industry responsible for 80% of the water usage in California? They surely couldn't just be asking urban consumers to reduce? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/2…

During the last big drought year in California (was it 2015 or so?) we turned our lawn into a drought-tolerant one — no more grass, no more watering the lawn. It was a little annoying to see the lush golf courses carry on with business (literally) as usual.

Great. This saved zero water though. You instead allowed the production of an additional handful of avocados (about 50 gallons each). I hope that was a fair trade.

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#98

Post by Retric »

FollowingTheDao wrote: post #70
stevenjgarner wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends how you view religion. "The Pew Religious Landscape survey reported that as of 2014, 22.8% of the American population is religiously unaffiliated, atheists made up 3.1% and agnostics made up 4% of the US population." [1] Probably the largest unrepresented population in US government, running as an atheist is still considered political suicide. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_atheism

And the Protestant and Catholics were at war with each other countless times (For 30 years in one case!) so it's not fair to say they are not one religion.

The same is true of every old religion. Americans generally lump all Muslims into one category, but there are serious divisions, associated wars and ethnic violence.

Even those major groups have fractal divisions. https://xkcd.com/1095/

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#99

Post by kolanos »

mdavis6890 wrote: post #92
kolanos wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might just be me, but I prioritize agriculture over swimming pools. It's strange that it is agriculture to blame when LA doesn't source its own water and instead diverts water from the central valleys away from agriculture. Agriculture doesn't "pay their fair share", yet LA is actively taking water away from agriculture and also draining 5-7 year reservoirs. When wild fires are in full swing we're going to reall…

The point is that if you add up ALL the swimming pools in California, it totals ~0 water. Not even a rounding error. Farmers measure water use in MILLIONS of ACRE FEET. There is even an acronym for it: MAF. There are rice paddies surrounding the capital city of Sacramento. Why do we keep asking residents to sacrifice for even trivial pleasurers like swimming, when it makes no difference at all?

Who is sacrificing exactly?

> The federal government said Wednesday that it won’t deliver water to farmers in California’s agricultural belt, which produces roughly a quarter of the nation’s food, due to the extreme water shortages that are expected to deepen if the direly dry conditions continue through March. [0]

HN is throttling me, so I'll put this here. the CVP is the largest in the country.

> In a normal year the CVP delivers about 7 million acre-feet of water for agricultural, urban, and wildlife use. [1]

[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/feb/23/rain-califor... [1]: https://www.watereducation.org/aquapedia/central-valley-proj...

Re: California Drought Update May 2022 [pdf]

#100

Post by sologoub »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #44
jillesvangurp wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Either way, Californians should stop pretending water is cheap, plentiful or sourced in a sustainable way. It simply isn't. Instead of pointing fingers at each other, the best way is to price it accordingly. The root problem is that this is not the case and it's too cheap. And it's only cheap because it comes from non renewable sources that are getting scarcer. Everybody feels entitled to the cheap water and then end…

This seems to be a carefully-considered market-based solution to a complex problem, but there are a few details I'm struggling with. Significantly increasing the price of a natural resource would have severe impacts on impoverished communities while having no effect at all on wealthy people and companies; is this intentional? Around 45% of households in California are rentals. Renters are often restricted by their re…

On mountains and inland valleys, CA population is concentrated on the coast, so this is not as much of an issue. Just build enough for households of the largest metro areas and leave the rest the water we would have used.

This doesn’t solve the agricultural issue at all, but given that a lot of what they produce is exported and not used locally, they should figure their own business out and not be even further subsidized by consumers/tax payers.

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