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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Jun 14, 2015 - 07:42pm PT
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Don't worry, folks. We won't be shipping water from Oregon, or Michigan.
It always sounds great, until you start talking about paying for it.
There is the issue of mountains in the way. You gotta lift the water over that.
Right now, the water from N. Cal has to be lifted over the Tehachapi Mountains. That uses 10% of all the energy used in Calif. The lift of water from the Colorado River Consumes about another 10%.
So 20% of ALL POWER USED IN CA, is used to lift water.
(Not true of the water from the Owens Valley, because it is all downhill. It actually generates a little power)
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Jun 14, 2015 - 07:50pm PT
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hey there say, ken m... ahhh, nice to hear that... :) AS, there needs to be more particle ways to solve things instead of making huge projects affecting the so many other things, in the way of such, etc... oh my...
all kinds of things go wrong, trying to do 'unnatural' stuff to solve natural troubles... :)
then, you have TWICE the trouble, :O
when THAT new stuff, goes wrong... :(
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Jun 14, 2015 - 09:04pm PT
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It is not really a water shortage problem in California, it is a water management problem. There are municipalities that did not even have water meters until recently. Large corporations are putting in new almond groves and pumping water out of the ground. That BS screams for unified management of water.
On the bright side, things look like they are lining up for a significant El Nino this winter. Tuna crabs are invading the local beaches, ocean temps are rising.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/tuna-crabs-invade-san-diego-beaches-thousands/story?id=31725696
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 14, 2015 - 11:51pm PT
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Thats alot of power! Also there's all the truck and train loads of bottled water.
Seems like we if we ran a tube from the higher elevation lake Superior down to 0 elev. LosAngeles, with a big suck we could get the water to flow for free?
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Jun 15, 2015 - 05:22am PT
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The Great Lakes had their own water shortage issues a few years back until they had record snowfalls...Harbors had to be dredged so that recreationist could get their boats onto the lakes..Get rid of the lawns and practice birth control if you want more water in California..
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zBrown
Ice climber
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Jun 15, 2015 - 07:39am PT
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Rough mileages
Winnipeg to New Orleans 2600
Ironwood MI to San Diego 2200
Maybe a double decker pipeline carrying oil in the club car section and water in the passenger class section?
Apparently hasn't been implemented elsewhere (I've got my patent guy researching it now), but you get the idea. Just stick it right on top.
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Jun 15, 2015 - 08:21am PT
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Just for discussion- you would need a big source for your water--The Great lakes basin is probably not big enough-it's just a basin holding five big tubs. So that leaves the Mississippi or the Columbia. The Columbia is pretty dang big as it goes into the ocean so that might be the source--AND it should make for some amusing comments coming from the those folks in the Pacific NW.
Probably the best thing is to give up on a lawn and go with rock gardens. I really don't pay too much attention to this as it doesn't affect me too much where I live. Sounds like a complex problem- and you mix in a city or two and a few million extra people. What could go wrong?
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Portland Oregon
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Jun 15, 2015 - 10:31am PT
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I
hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
Jun 15, 2015 - 08:21am PT
The Columbia is pretty dang big as it goes into the ocean so that might be the source--AND it should make for some amusing comments coming from the those folks in the Pacific NW.
Haha yeah. The first salmon that flops onto a dry beach and the tap gets turned off.
They are trying to take out the dams on the Snake and Columbia, and when recertification comes up, some won't be able to economically comply with new fish standards.
We'll send you power, but you better ask the Saudis how their desalination plants work.
Or stop growing rice and hay in a desert.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Jun 15, 2015 - 10:54am PT
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Lorenzo, what I can't tell from that chart is whether that is simply the total amount of water used for each crop, not paying any attention to the AMOUNT of each crop.
Obviously, if you have two crops that use the same amount of water, but one is produced at 10X the rate, it give the ILLUSION that the more heavily planted crop is using 10X the water. But it is not.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 15, 2015 - 11:14am PT
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The Great Lakes holds 1/5 of the entire worlds stored freshwater. Just sitting there doing nothing. It's ovious Calif has been the heart for progressive free thought, which has given way for the superior innovation's of the mind and body for the past 40 yrs. besides being the largest producer of foods in the northern hemisphere. The California dream is a model this nation should do everything in its power to uphold. We're already overly burdened and taxed with responsbilitys in providing help and assurance to so many states and countries.
Seems very legitament that we should pull from an abundant resource such as Lake Superior.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Jun 15, 2015 - 11:15am PT
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Another graphic:
The article this graphic comes from suggests that one easy solution is to buy out all the alfalfa farmers, tell them to let their fields go fallow, at a cost of about 20 bucks per CA resident, saving just about the entire water shortfall for the state. Voila....
http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-doing/
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G_Gnome
Trad climber
Cali
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Jun 15, 2015 - 12:47pm PT
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Once you buy out the alfalfa growers you will need to buy out all of the cattle ranchers cause the cows are gonna starve. I guess we could grow beans instead of alfalfa to provide the protein we are going to be missing.
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Portland Oregon
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Jun 15, 2015 - 01:07pm PT
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A
Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
Jun 15, 2015 - 10:54am PT
Lorenzo, what I can't tell from that chart is whether that is simply the total amount of water used for each crop, not paying any attention to the AMOUNT of each crop.
Obviously, if you have two crops that use the same amount of water, but one is produced at 10X the rate, it give the ILLUSION that the more heavily planted crop is using 10X the water. But it is not.
The chart seem to me to show the total irrigation water used for each crop.
http://www.arb.ca.gov/fuels/lcfs/workgroups/lcfssustain/hanson.pdf
The issue to me is how to best use a finite resource. Talking about piping Lake Superior or the Columbia seems on the level of towing icebergs from Antarctica. People in those regions will push back and are better equipped legally to do that than farmers in the Owens valley were 100 years ago. You need also consider that the ' no new taxes' mantra will make massive projects harder to fund.
Four crops : alfalfa, forage crops, cotton, and Rice consume somewhere between 13-15 million acre feet per year - roughly three times the volume of Mono lake or three times the volume LA uses a year, or three times California's Colorado river allotment. Alfalfa alone uses more water than LA or the Colorado allotment or Mono lake. It also loses more irrigation water to evaporation and transpiration than any other crop- by quite a bit.
These are low value crops that can be better grown in other regions of the country more economically if it were not for the federal water subsidies. Did you know that people in rain soaked Portland pay more for their water than LA? We get ours as runoff from Mount Hood.
As much as people say that using one gallon of irrigation water per almond is stupid, it at least pays better than those other crops.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 15, 2015 - 01:41pm PT
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Dingus, guess you don't understand the invisible power in a vacuum?
And easy to take the lazy mindful-less approach of jus letting those with money, aka. Big Corps. to man the literal flood gates?
Price inflation is a tool of the middle-class to segregate themselves from the poor.
It is the #1 factor that's led our economy into the drink.
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Portland Oregon
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Jun 15, 2015 - 01:48pm PT
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Jun 15, 2015 - 01:14pm PT
Make them pay market rate and let the market decide what's the best fit.
DMT
The funny thing about that is that if water sold for market rate the farmers would make more money selling the water than raising those four crops.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Jun 15, 2015 - 02:09pm PT
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Water is not merely a commodity!
It is the essence of life and is a right in regards to human consumption. Watering golf courses is a different story. The State has issued licenses and permits that's allowed the population to grow to today's level. And Yes, this has all been substantiated by the business market puppeted by big corps. And as long as there's growth and revenue and more taxes, the government will give it a yea nod.
The problem certainly spotlights the narrow mindedness of politicians unconcern for the future other than padding their pension.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Jun 15, 2015 - 02:30pm PT
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Farmers are generally not permitted to sell their water rights to cities. If they started selling them it would devastate farming communities economies, further distorting the screwed up mess we have created by giving away water to one class, and charging another class ten times as much.
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Jun 15, 2015 - 03:26pm PT
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hey there say, DMT... as to your quote...
very well said:
Everything has repercussion. The idea that once local resources are depleted, that its acceptable to then pillage neighboring areas for water... is wrong headed from the inception.
tamper, tamper, tamper... bad, bad, bad... :(
natural solutions, work with nature...
no lawns, etc... work with the land...
my mom was not born in calif, and came from ohio area...
she learned fast--yes, it IS lovely for gardens and flowers, but:
during the first few summers, she knew:
this was a place to take GREAT care how water IS used...
now, through the years, her yard, which has always been TO the 'perfectionist' of 'trackhomes agenda'--THE WORST yard in the neighborhood...
:O
she is wise... now her yard, is WHAT folks need to learn from...
barely needs water at all... the few roses that she has gotten as gifts, well, they just 'do with whatever the rains' give... or a small drink for simple emergencies...
it is basically all non-water-needs... she sure is a good example to us kids, though, me, i DO NOT live there now...
i learned--as best as we can learn-and-try, if we work with nature, it will 'be as freindly' as it is able: meaning, the storms of life, might 'bite a bite' but even those, there is a reason for...
hopes and prayers for calif, though, as so many loved ones and 'humans that have their loved one' will need to get through this...
sadly, human-nature, want to ignore--mainly, i think, as, it is easier than the effort to work at changes...
but, ignoring, or, pretending things don't affect bad choices, causes
far worse damage, later... as we ALL see, in many areas of life, not just the water issues, in calif... :(
:(
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