That line from “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” certainly doesn’t apply to the vast majority of the United States. While our grass looks pretty sad that’s of little significance to what the rest of the country is suffering. I cannot imagine the anxiety of wildfires sweeping toward whole towns or farmers getting up each morning, scanning the sky for hopeful clouds while their crops shrivel and die, the livestock find no forage and the watering ponds are empty.
This raises an interesting question: Is there less water in the world than a million years ago? I doubt it, but there certainly is a distribution problem. The density of population centers has outstripped the water supply to the point that an estimated 40% of the world’s population does not have safe drinking water. This leads to enormous problems in water-borne diseases about which we know nothing in North America. Our problems have to do with livestock and crops, on which we depend as well as much of the world.
We are told that the Colorado River supplies more than 40 million people in the southwest with water and hydroelectric power. The water required for the area is so great that the river usually runs dry before it ever empties in the Gulf of California.
There are river systems that are much greater than the Colorado. The Missouri is the second longest river in the country and is the watershed for more than a half million square miles, much of which is sparsely populated before it joins its great partner, the Mississippi, north of St. Louis. Ol’ Man River is the watershed for 31 states between the Appalachians and the Rockies.
Many other major rivers scattered throughout the country and despite their varied locations, the all have one thing in common: Periodically, there are massive floods. The polar ice caps are melting at a furious pace and ocean levels are rising to the point that many sections of the coastal areas are predicted to be under water in the next century.
The problem doesn’t seem to be the amount of water available, but its distribution. Rainfall varies from year to year, decade to decade, but the amount of water on the planet seems plentiful; it’s just not in the right locations.
Here’s an idea for our political candidates: Instead of sniping over trivia why not address the water distribution problem? A Water Way Interstate system of sorts where annual floods could be contained, saving property and then sending it where it was needed seems like a logical idea. We don’t have any trouble finding oil thousands of feet underground, a half world away and getting it delivered on a daily basis to extremely remote parts of the country. Why can’t we do that with water? Brown water, as it is called, is usually suitable for irrigation and livestock. After processing perhaps it even becomes drinkable.
Such a system of distribution would cost billions and generate more jobs that than CCC or the WPA ever imagined in FDR’s time. It would take decades to construct just as the Interstate Highway system did, but it would be worth it
The problems would be huge. Roosevelt did not have to deal with the EPA or environmental concerns. At some point, something has to give. We cannot guarantee the survival of every plant, animal, and fish on the planet. Remember the snail darter on the Tellico dam site in Tennessee? It took six years in the court before it was finally resolved and it was discovered the snail darter could live quite well in the Hiwassee River; they were removed from the endangered list in 1984. No one knows what the legal costs were, but they were huge before it reached the Supreme Court.
And finally, have you been to beach this summer? If you’re looking to win a Nobel Prize, then find a way to economically desalinate the oceans and harness their hydroelectric potential. That would solve the entire furor about nuclear power plants.
Not easy, but we shouldn’t be ignoring the problems just because it’s difficult. And I guess it’s not as entertaining as making fun of the candidates while totally avoiding policy solutions. If we don’t get some answers, then no water may be the least of our worries.
