The US megadrought!

[opendoor]

You can look at water level charts. Here's Oroville (you need to select all the years to see them):

http://oroville.lakesonline.com/Level/

So currently it's above 2021, but pretty far below the other years.

Shasta Lake is the largest reservoir in California, and that's significantly below prior years:

http://shasta.uslakes.info/Level/

[Snuffleupagus]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

I’m thinking the water level in that lake/reservoir is not an area that any of us are knowledgeable on. It seems to be wildly variable.

I think in 2015 it was drained on purpose ironically because there was too much water in the area because of a wet winter not a drought.

[FlamesAddiction]

It could just be the quality of the photos, but the in the 2015 picture, the landscape and vegetation looks browner in general leading me to think that the photo was taken in late summer and the 2017 photo taken in spring.

[Azure]

Its crazy how much water can be collected from run off and reused. I have some farmer friends in western Manitoba who went together and built a 60 million gallon water reservoir, and in this spring they diverted some run off water from JUST ditches (not creeks, rivers, etc), and filled it in 2 weeks with the snow melt and water run off through the ditches. Its not clean, and its not drinking water, and they still need to clean it, but it gives them 3 year supply for other stuff. Up till now them were paying $300k per year to the local township for all their water, now they just need to buy drinking water.

But they don't live in a desert, and a lot of the problems with California seem to come from trying to grow stuff in a desert area.

[Fuzz]

https://ggweather.com/seasonal_rain.htm


Last year was a low rainfall year, and this year looks to be below average almost everywhere. Looking at past graphs:
https://ggweather.com/water/


Typically not much more falls after April.

[Fuzz]

https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/southwest


Looks like it's been below average since~2000. So it's not just water over-use, it has been getting drier.

[Azure]

Great thread.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1553311232593207299

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by belsarius

With global temperatures 3 degrees warmer and sea levels 15-25m higher.

I don't get why people keep trying to use this argument. Sure it was worse in the past, but it was also a completely different ecosystem.

The atmosphere was able to handle much more CO2 than we currently have when the earth had no people. So it is possible.

[Street Pharmacist]

Again though, what's your point? The conditions that the higher CO2 caused make human life much more difficult compared to the last few thousand years. The planet is and will always be fine. It's just that humans need a very specific stable climate to thrive and we're on our way to leaving that behind...

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Again though, what's your point? The conditions that the higher CO2 caused make human life much more difficult compared to the last few thousand years. The planet is and will always be fine. It's just that humans need a very specific stable climate to thrive and we're on our way to leaving that behind...

That was my point. The level of CO2 that these people are advocating is a level of CO2 that would ensure no human life.

[Azure]

It always interesting to me to observe how California is creating their own drought, while at the same time yelling and screaming at everyone about climate change.

Nuclear plants + desalinization = water. Why is it so hard to understand?
They have a $100 billion dollar budget surplus, so money isn't the issue.
They are on the ocean, so salt water supply isn't the issue.
How can a province with so many resources and money be so dumb when it comes to these things?

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Azure

It always interesting to me to observe how California is creating their own drought, while at the same time yelling and screaming at everyone about climate change.

Nuclear plants + desalinization = water. Why is it so hard to understand?
They have a $100 billion dollar budget surplus, so money isn't the issue.
They are on the ocean, so salt water supply isn't the issue.
How can a province with so many resources and money be so dumb when it comes to these things?

Desalination isn’t cost effective for agriculture use relative to drilling wells. About $1 / m^3. Nuts and Beef are something like 15000 L/kg of water. So $15 / kg to use desalinated water. Chicken is better at like 4000L/kg.

“Free” water underwrites a lot of our food infrastructure.

[Mull]

Originally Posted by Azure

It always interesting to me to observe how California is creating their own drought, while at the same time yelling and screaming at everyone about climate change.

Nuclear plants + desalinization = water. Why is it so hard to understand?
They have a $100 billion dollar budget surplus, so money isn't the issue.
They are on the ocean, so salt water supply isn't the issue.
How can a province with so many resources and money be so dumb when it comes to these things?

Additional to the post above me correcting a few issues... I get why some would feel California is creating its own drought by depleting the river and ground water.
But isn't the factually incorrect? In the last ~20 years haven't they had less rainfall then any time since like the year 800?

https://www.latimes.com/environment/...-in-1200-years

The extreme dryness that has ravaged the American West for more than two decades now ranks as the driest 22-year period in at least 1,200 years, and scientists have found that this megadrought is being intensified by humanity’s heating of the planet.
The researchers found the current drought wouldn’t be nearly as severe without global warming. They estimated that 42% of the drought’s severity is attributable to higher temperatures caused by greenhouse gases accumulating in the atmosphere.

So to wholly blame climate change is a mistake, water management is a huge issue here and only blaming climate change allows those profiting from the current water management plan to get a way with their actions.

But... to ignore climate change as part of the problem as you seem to imply is also a mistake.

[Azure]

Reality is what it is. Whether you want to blame agriculture or climate change for the drought, there is still a drought, and the solution isn't to just ignore it.

Reality is that both are at fault. The way we grow and harvest food is not sustainable for a lot of high-water need items. Imperial Valley is a great example of pretty bone-headed long term planning when it comes to water usage.

But at the same time we can't ignore drought conditions due to rising climates.

However, there is a clear path forward, and it is strange California with all their money doesn't see it.

Assuming wells aren't an issue (and they are GGG, because many are drying up as well).

California is planning to close Canyon Diablo Nuclear Plant, which could easily power multiple desalinization plants.

Israel has had massive success with their water management.

$100 billion could build 50 desalinization plants, which would solve most of the water issues.

But no, they'll likely spend it on something else.

[Mull]

Originally Posted by Azure

Reality is what it is. Whether you want to blame agriculture or climate change for the drought, there is still a drought, and the solution isn't to just ignore it.

Reality is that both are at fault. The way we grow and harvest food is not sustainable for a lot of high-water need items. Imperial Valley is a great example of pretty bone-headed long term planning when it comes to water usage.

But at the same time we can't ignore drought conditions due to rising climates.

However, there is a clear path forward, and it is strange California with all their money doesn't see it.

Assuming wells aren't an issue (and they are GGG, because many are drying up as well).

California is planning to close Canyon Diablo Nuclear Plant, which could easily power multiple desalinization plants.

Israel has had massive success with their water management.

$100 billion could build 50 desalinization plants, which would solve most of the water issues.

But no, they'll likely spend it on something else.

Ok, I thought you were implying Climate change is not at fault.
You're simply saying, well even if it is, they need to act now to fix the water issue and fixing climate change won't save them before the water runs out.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by GGG

Desalination isn’t cost effective for agriculture use relative to drilling wells. About $1 / m^3. Nuts and Beef are something like 15000 L/kg of water. So $15 / kg to use desalinated water. Chicken is better at like 4000L/kg.

“Free” water underwrites a lot of our food infrastructure.

If you can drill a well and have access to water, go for it.

But the reality is in California many of the aquifers are struggling as well.

What they are doing is not sustainable.

Israel has been extremely successful with water management relating to agriculture, so the solution is available.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Mull

Ok, I thought you were implying Climate change is not at fault.
You're simply saying, well even if it is, they need to act now to fix the water issue and fixing climate change won't save them before the water runs out.

Yup.

Fixing climate change is up in the air anyways. Even with massive efforts, we can't necessarily control whether or not a drought happens, and the timeline of reversing course will take far too long.

There needs to be a plan in place to fix the water issues.

I personally don't really care, because at the end of the day as a consumer I choose not to eat the foods that come from California if possible, and if they don't reverse course, many consumers will deal with the same reality.

But it is a great example of how dumb governments are and how slow they move when it comes to certain issues.

The meeting should take 5 min.
Is there a solution? Yes.
Do we have the money to pay for this solution? Yes.
Start working. Whatever it takes.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by Azure

Yup.

Fixing climate change is up in the air anyways. Even with massive efforts, we can't necessarily control whether or not a drought happens, and the timeline of reversing course will take far too long.

There needs to be a plan in place to fix the water issues.

I personally don't really care, because at the end of the day as a consumer I choose not to eat the foods that come from California if possible, and if they don't reverse course, many consumers will deal with the same reality.

But it is a great example of how dumb governments are and how slow they move when it comes to certain issues.

The meeting should take 5 min.
Is there a solution? Yes.
Do we have the money to pay for this solution? Yes.
Start working. Whatever it takes.

If the cost of desalinated water makes agriculture not viable, and agriculture uses 80% of California's water, where is the solution there?

California is constructing desalination plants, but with the amount of water that agriculture uses (particularly things that should never be grown in a place like California) it's going to be a drop in the bucket. And the end result will likely be residential consumers paying significantly higher prices for desalinated water so giant corporations can keep blowing 15-20% of the state's water growing almonds and pistachios for export in the Central Valley.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by opendoor

If the cost of desalinated water makes agriculture not viable, and agriculture uses 80% of California's water, where is the solution there?

California is constructing desalination plants, but with the amount of water that agriculture uses (particularly things that should never be grown in a place like California) it's going to be a drop in the bucket. And the end result will likely be residential consumers paying significantly higher prices for desalinated water so giant corporations can keep blowing 15-20% of the state's water growing almonds and pistachios for export in the Central Valley.

Who is saying that it isn't viable?

Other countries have had great success with desalinization water for agriculture use. Many have built these plants to run on 100% renewable energy sources.

Water quality can be better.
Cost is dependent on the energy source, but with renewable energy sources, the cost per L comes down over the lifespan of the energy source. Considerably.

Just a few years ago, in the depths of its worst drought in at least 900 years, Israel was running out of water. Now it has a surplus. That remarkable turnaround was accomplished through national campaigns to conserve and reuse Israel’s meager water resources, but the biggest impact came from a new wave of desalination plants.

Israel now gets 55 percent of its domestic water from desalination, and that has helped to turn one of the world’s driest countries into the unlikeliest of water giants.

Except Israel. Amazingly, Israel has more water than it needs. The turnaround started in 2007, when low-flow toilets and showerheads were installed nationwide and the national water authority built innovative water treatment systems that recapture 86 percent of the water that goes down the drain and use it for irrigation — vastly more than the second-most-efficient country in the world, Spain, which recycles 19 percent.

But even with those measures, Israel still needed about 1.9 billion cubic meters (2.5 billion cubic yards) of freshwater per year and was getting just 1.4 billion cubic meters (1.8 billion cubic yards) from natural sources. That 500-million-cubic-meter (650-million-cubic-yard) shortfall was why the Sea of Galilee was draining like an unplugged tub and why the country was about to lose its farms.

Enter desalination. The Ashkelon plant, in 2005, provided 127 million cubic meters (166 million cubic yards) of water. Hadera, in 2009, put out another 140 million cubic meters (183 million cubic yards). And now Sorek, 150 million cubic meters (196 million cubic yards). All told, desal plants can provide some 600 million cubic meters (785 million cubic yards) of water a year, and more are on the way.

The Sea of Galilee is fuller. Israel’s farms are thriving. And the country faces a previously unfathomable question: What to do with its extra water?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...n-era-is-here/

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by Azure

Who is saying that it isn't viable?

Look at the water requirements GGG posted above and compare that to the price of desalination. Do you think spending $0.75-1.00 on water to produce 1 liter of milk is a viable practice?

Other countries have had great success with desalinization water for agriculture use. Many have built these plants to run on 100% renewable energy sources.

Water quality can be better.
Cost is dependent on the energy source, but with renewable energy sources, the cost per L comes down over the lifespan of the energy source. Considerably.

Israel primarily uses treated wastewater and groundwater for agriculture, precisely because desalinated water is too expensive.

They also generally grow climate-appropriate crops and put a heavy focus on water (e.g. using drip irrigation). If California did the same, they wouldn't have a water shortage (or much need for desalination).

Desalination costs can and will come down, but California already has very expensive electricity. And building a bunch of nuclear plants (which is about the most expensive form of electricity generation) isn't going to make things cheaper.