from Hacker News

Water crisis coming in 15 years unless the world acts now, UN report warns

by jayfuerstenberg on 3/20/15, 7:04 PM with 61 comments

• by phkahler on 3/20/15, 7:43 PM

  They point to population growth as a contributing factor, yet they never suggest anyone do anything about that.

  How about free birth control to anyone who wants it? How about permanent birth control to any adult who wants it? I'd say free to anyone below some income level since the middle class can afford it anyway. With increasing productivity we don't have jobs for all the people anyway, why not encourage making less of them?

  I'm not talking about mandates or government deciding who reproduces, just having them help folks that would prefer not to have kids to not have them. The solution doesn't always have to be more regulation.

• by FilterJoe on 3/20/15, 7:46 PM

  With all the talk of water running out in CA and the world, I am wondering why desalination is not part of the conversation. According to Wikipedia:

  "Supplying all domestic water by sea water desalination would increase the United States' energy consumption by around 10%, about the amount of energy used by domestic refrigerators."

  Is this true? If so, why isn't desalination happening on a massive scale in CA?

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desalination#Considerations_and...

  EDIT: The Wikipedia sentence I quoted was not clearly written. It should have said "supplying all household water" not "supplying all domestic water." Far more water is used by farming.

• by Lethe101 on 3/20/15, 8:36 PM

  Something that bears mentioning when you read this type of report:

  If something is 10-20 years in the future in these types of models, this has:

  a) Already happened unless b) there are major changes / interactions that scientific models have not had factored in while c) Anthropic actions cannot change this, but it can change x+n where X is original time and n is the 'down ramp' from your curve.

  For instance: if your Co2 is 400ppm now, then the effects have already happened 20-50 years into the future. It can be made much much worse through events before you hit that time (let us say either Yellowstone or the entire of India / China buying a car per family) but your actions in the interim are merely altering the effects after time X.

  In the case of water we can say: model presents X+n time > if action: such as massive investment in desalination and/or new osmosis materials (positive to time change) minus climate impacts we've not noticed yet (negatives to time change) where n is less than continued effect without any other imputs.

  This is a rather loopy way to say:

  People think of these types of announcements as future based predictions: they're not, they're present events if (and only if) your models don't change.

  [Note: this isn't to say they're scientifically incorrect - but this inability to understand time in these types of reports fuels a lot of ignorance from both "sides" of Climate / Ecological debates]

• by rootedbox on 3/20/15, 8:12 PM

  Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean.

  Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink.

• by mercnet on 3/20/15, 8:22 PM

  Possible water crisis in the future, and governments are selling water supplies for $2.25 per million litres! http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/03/06/outrage-boils-over-a...

• by joeclark77 on 3/20/15, 8:11 PM

  I bet they've got their finger right on a set of great solutions: (1) more money for the UN, (2) more sovereign power handed over to the UN, (3) more money from the UN to fund more studies on why more money should be given to the UN, (4) more posh conferences for UN and UN-related bigshots in exotic locales, (5) annihilate Israel, (6) new Nobel prizes to be handed out to UN-grant-funded researchers promoting increased funding of the UN at UN-sponsored conferences...

• by nobleach on 3/20/15, 8:03 PM

  With the rising sea levels (due to global warming), wouldn't now be the best time to figure out how to pipe that desalinated water all over the continents?

• by youngtaff on 3/20/15, 8:12 PM

  If our weather is getting more unpredictable due to climate change why don't we get better at capturing the heavy rain we experience in some parts of the world and allowing it to sink in to the ground rather than running off into rivers.

  Particularly thinking of some of the flooding in UK and Europe over the last decade.

  If the ice caps melt due to rising temperature surely this means more water in the atmosphere and more rain in some places?

• by webXL on 3/20/15, 10:29 PM

  This is a non issue, provided that economic growth continues. That 10% of energy costs which desalination would add, we just choose to spend it on things not as vital. With economic growth, we just spend more and more of the new wealth on building desal infrastructure. If we're able to add nuclear to the mix, it lowers our total energy cost freeing up some additional room for desal. Fusion will definitely make this a non issue.

• by mark_l_watson on 3/20/15, 11:37 PM

  As more of the world becomes middle class, there is more demand for meat protein. This is a problem since it takes about 10 times the water (and also energy) to support non-vegetarian diets.

• by niche on 3/20/15, 8:02 PM

  Introducing Aquabob! Imagine: a dome that collects condensation (think morning dew). It waters your greenhouse, and leaves you with plenty to water down for those midnight cocktails

• by guyzero on 3/20/15, 7:56 PM

  Once again, Silicon Valley is way ahead of the curve.

• by evo_9 on 3/20/15, 7:31 PM

  Whew, thank god. Cause the Peak Oil guys sure need something new to fret about.

  And these things always come true exactly as predicted because, you know, progress doesn't continue along, Moore's Law doesn't continue along.