With 67 million people blogging and news blogs rivaling mainstream media, the amount of information being churned out in posts is overwhelming—but recently a few themes have emerged that warrant attention.
This time around, bloggers focused on California Water Bond, water planning and policy, desalination and Arizona’s Colorado River water supply.
The California Water Bond
Size of California’s water bond does matter but how it’s spent matters more
A post on the California Economic Summit argues that as the public debate has shown, the size of the water bond is important—but paramount “to voters is how these funds will be used to ensure billions in water projects solve California’s long-term water issues—and prevent the state from lurching from water crisis to water crisis.”
California’s “Treading Water” Bond
Rodney T. Smith, Ph.D. of the Hydrowonk Blog discusses the implications of the legislature’s failure to pass a bond measure before summer recess and what must occur to get a bond passed in August.
California’s “Treading Water” Bond: Part Deux
Further rounding out his discussion of what is going on the with the water bond, the Hydrowonk Blog’s Rodney T. Smith, Ph.D. gets into why we are still talking water bond even though the June 26th deadline has passed and the political implications and practical considerations of the options available to still replace the water bond.
Planning and Policy
Water: The Price Is Wrong
Benjamin Powell, Senior Fellow at the Independent Institute and Director of the Free Market Institute at Texas Tech University, writes in the Huffington Post that water shortages “are a man-made result of bad economic policy,” and advocates for raising prices on water volume and allowing people to choose what water uses are most valuable to them—instead of imposing conservation restrictions on a subsidized resource.
Estimates do not Meet Reality, Time to Improve Texas Water Planning
Posting on the Environment Defense Fund’s blog, Richard Lowerre, Attorney with Frederick, Perales, Allmon & Rockwell, outlines the major findings in a recent report by the Texas Center for Policy Studies. Based on those findings, Lowerre argues that water projections in the 2012 State Water Plan are inflated advocates for adoption of recommendations made by TCPS in order to better balance interests and provide a smarter planning process.
How is the Drought Affecting California’s Water Rights?
Jeff Simonetti of the Hydrowonk Blog discusses the curtailment of water rights in Northern California and the dialog about whether senior rights should also be curtailed in these extreme times.
Desalination
Are Desalination Plants Solution to World’s Fresh Water Crisis?
In a post on The Green Optimistic, blogger Mila Luleva discusses the worldwide proliferation of desalination, the ensuing controversies, and the possibility that it really is the only solution to meeting current and future water demands in some areas.
Water, Water Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink….
Posting on the Huffington Post, Jennifer Schwab, Chief Sustainability for scgh.com, looks at Santa Barbara and its neighbor Montecito as a case study of what can happen if we don’t get moving on plans to bolster water supplies—and ultimately advocates for advancing on the various desalination plans in the works in Southern California.
Arizona’s Colorado River Water Supply
Water war bubbling up between California and Arizona
In The Economy Hub, Michael Hilzik of the Los Angeles Times reflects on the history and politics of sharing the Colorado River—and discusses the complications of solutions that have been proposed to keep Lake Mead above the critical 1,000-ft elevation.
Official: Phoenix could survive future CAP shortage
Tony Davis, reporter for the Arizona Daily Star, blogs about the impact a declared shortage on the Colorado River would have CAP users.
Written by Marta L. Weismann