Tomgram: Chip Ward, The Ruins in Our Future It's actually kind of interesting, in a horrifying way, now that I think about it. I've seen the droughts in other parts of the world. I went to Kenya in 2007. Spent some time with agricultural types. They were unhappy because Kenya had been suffering a drought for a while, and it's apparently still going on. In 2008 I visited Jaipur. There were these big rectangular holes in the ground with little puddles of dirty water on the bottom. I asked some locals what was up. They had been reservoirs, but they'd all dried up, causing much hardship to everyone involved. And there's droughts happening all over the world. 2009 saw record-breaking temperatures in my home state of Washington. This is scary as shit, because it ain't even 2010 yet. What happens when we start to see waves of climate refugees fleeing to... wherever? The sea levels are rising. I live on the coast. That's fucking scary. Why is this in politics? If you don't think water resources are going to become a major political issue then your head is in the sand.
There are already films about it..."Water Wars" and others... Blue Gold: World Water Wars (2008) Flow: For Love of Water (2008) to name a few.
Here in California there has always been drought problems, the lower half of our central valley isn't receiving water because it was cut off. Australia is getting hit bad, almost 50% of their agriculture has diminished because of their current drought. Hopefully they will be able to get back up on their feet and have no problems. The battle for water is near. The big problem will be when East Asia starts to run out of its water source from the Himalayas.
Wow, I can't believe that wiki article says ice is melting due to 'human induced' global warming, and not naturally induced... as if its already proven. But seriously man, you should probably move away from the coast within the next couple hundred years if you don't want to wear galoshes to work.
I don't think desalination would be much of a solution. It might be able to meet some people's needs but frankly, desalination is extremely expensive and energy-intensive. There's a reason that the only places that really make use of it very much right now are in the oil-rich countries of the Middle East. And we should implement that but for everybody on Earth whose freshwater melted and ran into the sea thousands of years too early? Or should we just leave some of them out to dry- literally? Think of the water pipelines you'd need to keep people living in, say, Nebraska. Or maybe you can't just let people continue to live in Nebraska and force them to move to a coast. Everybody loves refugees in their back yard, right? And if you consider the importance of water to sustaining life in general, the political impact of water turning from something you can find most anywhere on Earth into a precious resource that you need to pipe in from the coasts would be worse than the shit we put up with for oil. I think desalination at best can only cushion the impact, and even if it becomes viable it's going to lead to a lot of chaos. Water used to be free. What happens when it's $5 a liter and political importance starts to be measured in terms of how long your coast is?
Ohh its definietly human induced, but not like everyone would think. Any of you guys ever heard of HARRP? If not i strongly suggest you research it. They openly talk about this.. they can control the weather, create earthquakes..etc. "global warming" is just a huge scam to gain control and money. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkLTzesBxGE"]YouTube - HAARP CBC Broadcast Weather control part 1[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zi1nLmlicxU&NR=1"]YouTube - HAARP CBC Broadcast Weather control part 2[/ame]