More on the Water Wars

[ysabetwordsmith]

Here's another article on how water shortage leads to violence.

Water isn't just a resource. Water is life. Learn that or die. Our bodies are made of water, with a sprinkling of other materials for shape. We can't survive without it. The climate depends on it; the biosphere depends on it; life depends on it.

So of course, when it's scarce, it gets fought over. Watch the wildlife when watering holes start to dry up. They become the focus of most of the local ecosystem. The same thing has held true of human civilizations.

Breadbaskets aren't the real cradle of civilization. Water is. Until fairly recently, when humanity embarked on its imbecilic quest to build cities in places with insufficient water, all human settlements sprouted near water sources. Where there's not enough water, there are no humans or they are nomadic and have no settlements. Civilization is a thing of bays and lakes and rivers; in the desert, of oases and other special sources of water. Look at a map and you'll find towns and cities clustered where there is abundant water. Only with the advent of piping and damming have we broken that trend, and we're starting to pay the price.

Understand this: We can't keep spending water like money.

Comments

Re: A tad of thinking.

[daemonfall.livejournal.com]

And destroy all those pretty, useful, life-filled swamps? I prefer waste-water recycling myself. You get fertilizers, chemical ingredients, pure poison and potable water all in one fell stroke.
Now to just convince some bunny-headed officials...

Re: A tad of thinking.

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

No, a swamp filter is a constructed swamp. It's one of the most efficient ways to purify water, even sewage. There are at least two ways to do it: one with big tanks of shallow water, and a mix of algae and floaters like water hyacinth. The other uses a maze of shallow clay trenches and sandbanks, and marginal as well as water plants. I found some articles on the topic in a pondkeeping magazine first, but later came across others that dealt with municipal waste-handling. It just uses a natural system as a pattern for a constructed one.

Re: A tad of thinking.

[daemonfall.livejournal.com]

Huh, surely made me look like a fool.
I prefer the first method, as it conserves on ground-area. I prefer that to plain-old distillation, and prefer semi-conductive sheets and pressurized water to swamp filtering. If they get it right on industrial scale, you could probably solve most cities waste-water problems. Now just to get it right...

Re: A tad of thinking.

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

Different methods work in different areas, too. All the ones we've been discussing have their uses. One reason I like swamp filters is because the later portions of modular SFs are both attractive and good habitat. Once the material comes out of the algae tanks, it's far enough along that you can cycle it outside and let wildlife enjoy it. Plus some of the best plants -- sweet flags and water hyacinths -- are lovely to look at.

I like to grow water hyacinths in my tub gardens in summer. They have these amazing long feathery black roots, and their pale lilac flowers come up on spikes that look a bit like gladioli.

But then I'm fascinated with biotechnology in general. I like using things the Earth is already designed to do. Compost is another good example. It takes nature about a hundred years to make an inch of topsoil. A determined human can make a yard of compost in about two weeks, and a lazy human can do it in one growing season.

Re: A tad of thinking.

[daemonfall.livejournal.com]

Good closer for this debate. Complementary solutions to a state. Energy remains the main problem (IMHO), while water is just an expression of it. However, conserving and moving energy is great deal more complicated then moving water.
And that's a wholly different debate.