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Strawberry Case Study: What If U.S. Farmers Had to Pay for Water?
December 29th, 2023
Courtesy of the New York Times, a case study examining the impact of California’s efforts to essentially tax groundwater: The strawberry, blackberry and raspberry fields of the Pajaro Valley stretch for 10 miles along the coast of California’s Monterey Bay, jeweled with fruit from April through early December. The valley’s 30,000 acres of farmland are […]
Read more »Is Balkhash Facing Fate of Aral Sea?
December 29th, 2023
Via Central Asian Bureau for Analytical Reporting, a report on Lake Balkhash’s complex hydro future: Now Balkhash is a natural site. If a nuclear power plant is built on the lake, it will turn into an industrial pond. It will let China limit the Ili river flow feeding the lake, and the new load on […]
Read more »In California, Restored Floodplains Can Help Solve the State’s Water Crisis
December 29th, 2023
Via Fast Company, a look at how restored floodplains in California’s agricultural heartland are fighting both flooding and drought The land of the Central Valley works hard. Here in the heart of California, in the most productive farming region in the United States, almost every square inch of land has been razed, planted, and shaped […]
Read more »America: Draining Its Precious Groundwater to Make More Chicken Wings and Pizza
December 25th, 2023
Courtesy of The New York Times, a detailed look at how America is draining its precious groundwater to make more chicken wings and pizza: America’s striking dietary shift in recent decades, toward far more chicken and cheese, has not only contributed to concerns about American health but has taken a major, undocumented toll on underground […]
Read more »Taliban’s Hydropower Plans Raise Concerns In Pakistan
December 24th, 2023
Via Radio Free Europe, commentary on how the Taliban’s ambitious plans to build a dam on the Kunar River in Afghanistan are raising hackles in Islamabad: Plans by the Afghan Taliban to build a hydroelectric dam on a major river in eastern Afghanistan have raised concerns in neighboring Pakistan. A spokesman for the Taliban’s Water and Energy […]
Read more »The Fate of the West’s Water Rests on the Shoulders of This 27-Year-Old
December 24th, 2023
Courtesy of Politico, a report on J.B. Hamby’s efforts to find a way to convince California’s cities and farmers to cut a deal over the Colorado River: When the highest stakes water negotiations in a century opened this fall, the largest, most powerful state — California — was represented by the youngest person at the table, […]
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