tagged w/ Global Water Crisis
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On July 4, 2010, Joost Notenboom and Michiel Roodenburg set off from Deadhorse, Alaska, on a more-than-18,000-mile journey to the southern tip of Argentina. Their chosen mode of transport: bamboo bicycles. Their mission: to raise awareness of the global water crisis that leaves more than 1 billion people without access to safe drinking water. Eighteen months, 14,000 miles, and 62 flat tires later, we caught up with them just long enough to ask a few questions about their trip so far -- and their plans for when they finish, which, if all goes as planned, will happen in just a few more months. To learn more about their trip, or to support local water projects along their route, check out their website.
Q. What are a couple of Dutchmen doing shouting about water scarcity? Last I checked, there was no dearth of the wet stuff around your corner of the globe.
A. True, true. We actually started getting really interested in water once we finished our university exchange program in Israel a few years ago. (That's also where we met.) Joost was writing his thesis on the issue of water in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, and that was where we both saw that water is something that people will fight about.
It's also not only a question of scarcity. It's about energy, about food, about climate change, about ecosystems. Water is the basic building block of life. So it's true that back home, we don't have many issues with access to clean water -- everyone has a tap with water coming out -- but we do feel the effects of climate change when the sea levels will start to rise; we do pollute our rivers through industry; and through international trade we increase our virtual water footprint.
What we wanted to do with this trip is learn as much as possible about some of these different issues surrounding water.
Q. Tell the truth, is this not just an excuse to have an epic cycling adventure?
A. Also very true. We cannot say that this is something that we hate doing. It's a lot of fun, and every day is another adventure, literally. But who says you can't do both? Trying to do some good doesn't have to be sacrificial or tiresome; you can have fun while doing it, right?
Visiting these water projects, trying to learn something, doing presentations to share our experiences -- that keeps it very interesting for us. We also get to visit places where tourists normally don't come. This is because we're cycling through some of the tiniest little towns, and on some of the shittiest and most deserted back roads. But it is also because we get asked to come check out remote projects, or talk at universities. This way we get to know so much more about a place and its people than doing a standard Lonely Planet-guided backpack trip.
Q. Have you ever attempted to ghost ride your bikes into a ditch and book a flight home?
A. We've seen a lot of beauty, and we've lived together every day for the past 18 months. We've shared all the ups and the downs, and we both think this is a big reason why we haven't been tempted to book a flight back yet. There's always someone to cheer you up or push you along; doing this kind of thing alone would be something very, very different.
But the most inspiring thing so far has to be the kindness of the people we meet along the way. It's sort of unusual to see two guys on bamboo bikes hauling trailers full of gear. We guess it's instantly clear we're going a long way and people respond to that by offering us a place to stay, advice on travel conditions, a kind word, food, or just a wave from their car as they pass us by. We've had so many encounters with wonderful people that it has completely reinforced our faith in humanity.
Q. What does the water crisis look like? What are some of the images that will stick in your minds?
A. It really is water crises (plural). It has so many faces. It might be a global issue, but every country or region has its own specific consequences and realities.
It's for instance the three little girls pulling a rope together to haul one bucket of water from a well in the tiny little mountain community of Xepatan, in Guatemala. It's hard work, and because these girls have to help their mom doing these chores, this means they cannot go to school. Access to a clean water supply, more than anything else, gives you time. Not having to walk hours a day simply fetching and carrying water means that kids (because it's mostly them that do this) can just be kids, and play and go to school.
It's also the image of not seeing the pink river dolphin in the Amazon Basin. We were invited to go to the Amazon and learn more about this, the largest reservoir of freshwater on our planet, draining more than one-fifth of the world's total river flow. River dolphins are a bellwether species in this aquatic environment, and their health is directly correlated to the health of the forest. Not seeing them means that their environment is most likely in trouble, and we learned that this is mainly due to big hydroelectric projects, pollution [from] gold mining, and deforestation.
Q. Tell us about some of the water projects you've seen or been involved in.
A. There are so many examples of successful projects that made a difference in the lives of those they were intended for. There are solutions for the billion people who don't have access to clean water today; there are solutions for the 2.5 billion who don't have access to basic sanitation. It's a matter of reaching those people and giving them that one little push so they can help themselves. Because -- and we've seen this time and time again -- it's always the local people themselves who want to change their own situation. They get fed up with their kids getting sick, or their crops failing, or their animals dying, and they are clever and proud and entrepreneurial enough to seek out solutions.
We remember going to a fancy university in Costa Rica, and the people there showed us a biodigester they had made which collected all the waste from the student dorms and turned it into energy and clean water. This was their prototype and they were very proud of it. A few months later, in Colombia, we saw the same thing at someone's farm. He had built his own biodigester a few years back because he couldn't afford his electricity bill anymore. He'd just thought of it and it seemed to him like a good idea. Now he collects the sewage from his own house and from his pigs and converts that into power and water. The waste is then used as fertilizer. Sustainable development in action!
Q. What good are you? What have you done to help solve the problem?
A. We can't solve the problem, so we're probably not very good. We're not the fastest cyclists either, nor the strongest; and we're not even the first. We haven't raised the most money, or brought our own water footprint down to zero ... Riding a bicycle from the Arctic to the Antarctic ... is actually sort of easy. But effecting real change is difficult and slow ...
We are raising donations for small, local water projects, and we've deliberately not chosen to raise funds for one big, international NGO. We like those small projects that previously didn't have a chance of reaching out to international private donors, and had to depend solely on public money. So we've supported one pump-building project in Guatemala so far; getting that $20,000 budget financed took a long time. And now we're trying to do the same for another water filtration project in Colombia for which $10,000 has already been raised, and that still needs $4,000.
More at the linkOn July 4, 2010, Joost Notenboom and Michiel Roodenburg set off from Deadhorse,... more
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Charity Water has been doing wonderful things to bring potable water to those who need it most. Over four thousand projects this year alone. In the coming years with climate change and pollution having a greater effect in a world with a growing population, potable water and sanitation will be even more essential to life.
There is no better gift to give than water. To see the smile on the face of a child as they put clean water from a tap to their lips for the first time to drink is unlike any other.
2011 was a year in which we saw more water sources compromised by scarcity, pollution and the effects of climate change (such as drought, evaporation, floods.) This coming year will be no less of a challenge. However, when we work together for a common cause we can do wonders.
Let us make 2012 the year we begin to heal this planet and bring this living liquid to all in our world who need it.
Water Is Life.
As 2012 starts I will be featuring other water organizations also working to provide potable water to those who need it most.Charity Water has been doing wonderful things to bring potable water to those who need... more
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When I started this blog several years ago these were the main areas of concern surrounding lack of access and potability of water in the world. And as with the climate crisis there have been many people out here talking about this and trying to educate people in doing what is necessary to provide this human right to all and warning of the consequences of not doing so. Unfortunately, though we have come some part of the way thanks to education, activism and the work of NGOs like Charity Water and others whose links I will also post here there is a long way to go.
As we are now seeing across the globe privitization is still trying to make more of a headway (even though we have seen initiatives in Germany, Italy and in the US in stopping this insidious move to control our global water supply) and moving to "commoditize" water in a market system sure to deprive the most poor of this basic human right even though it was declared so at the UN.
War is also playing a part. As a result of the tumultuous battles taking place in Libya the Great Manmade River Project started by Gaddafi (and this is not to be a political post so I will refrain from discussing opinions of him) which regardless of politics was and is an engineering marvel (I will post video on that here too) has been bombed and essentially shut down thereby cutting off water to more than half of Tripoli and other regions. Water is then still being used as a weapon of war which I find insidious regardless of who does it.
We are seeing as well increasing pollution levels in rivers, continued toxification of our oceans, acidification of our oceans, plastic garbage patches in our ocean's gyres that stretch for miles and on top of all of this, effects of a changing climate brought on by human activity that now threaten water supplies for billions of people worldwide and the systems that sustain our marinelife.
What are we to make of all of this? Are we finally reaching the point where more people will discover just how crucial water is to all of the systems that sustain us? If not, by the time critical mass is reached will it be beyond saving? For the next couple of weeks I will be writing and reporting on ways that we are affecting water and also ways we can save it. In the world we live in now water access has never been more of an urgent crisis.
That is why supporting organizations like Chartity Water are essential in working to provide equality, access and potability of water to the billions who now go without and that also includes adequate sanitation. It is unfathomable to believe that in the 21st century with all of the technological advances we have achieved that we still cannot provide basic sanitation and potable water for the people who live on this planet, even now as we explore other worlds. I say, let's take better care of the one we have now.
Please watch this video and look at the links to other organizations I will post here and reflect on what you can do to address this crisis locally and globally. Water is the one tie that binds us all. We cannot afford to lose it.
More at the link.When I started this blog several years ago these were the main areas of concern... more
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Every single day, we are getting closer to a horrific global water crisis. This world was blessed with an awesome amount of fresh water, but because of our foolishness it is rapidly disappearing. Rivers, lakes and major underground aquifers all over the globe are drying up, and many of the fresh water sources that we still have available are so incredibly polluted that we simply cannot use them anymore. Without fresh water, we simply cannot function. Just imagine what would happen if the water got cut off in your house and you were not able to go out and buy any. Just think about it. How long would you be able to last? Well, as sources of fresh water all over the globe dry up, we are seeing drought conditions spread. We are starting to see massive "dust storms" in areas where we have never seem them before. Every single year, most of the major deserts around the world are getting bigger and the amount of usable agricultural land in most areas is becoming smaller. Whether you are aware of this or not, the truth is that we are rapidly approaching a breaking point.Every single day, we are getting closer to a horrific global water crisis. This world... more
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With cutting-edge nanotech, Michael Pritchard's Lifesaver water-purification bottle could revolutionize water-delivery systems in disaster-stricken areas around the globe.With cutting-edge nanotech, Michael Pritchard's Lifesaver water-purification... more
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A severe winter drought is threatening crop production in China, the world's biggest wheat provider, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said in an alert issued Tuesday. Substantially below-normal rainfall since October in Northern China has not only put the crop at risk but has also caused shortages in drinking water affecting over 2.57 million people and their livestock, FAO said.
"The ongoing drought is potentially a very serious problem," the Rome-based agency's alert said, adding that the main affected provinces -- around 5.16 million hectres -- represent two-thirds of national wheat production.
On Monday, the FAO warned that floods and heavy rain across southern Africa have damaged thousands of hectares (acres) of farmland, raising fears for food supplies.
World food prices reached their highest level ever recorded in January and are set to keep rising for months, the agency said last week, warning that the hardest-hit countries could face turmoil.
Rising food prices have been cited among the driving forces behind recent popular revolts in north Africa, including the uprising in Egypt and the ouster of Tunisia's president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali after a 23-year rule.
And in its latest survey, FAO said its index which monitors monthly price changes for a variety of staples averaged 231 points in January -- the highest level since records began in 1990.A severe winter drought is threatening crop production in China, the world's... more
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Theodore Roosevelt once noted that "civilized people ought to know how to dispose of the sewage in some other way than putting it into the drinking water." But that's what we're still doing every day.
The one-time use of water to disperse human and industrial wastes is an outmoded practice, made obsolete by new technologies and water shortages. Yet it is still common around much of the world. Water enters a city, becomes contaminated with human and industrial wastes, and leaves the city dangerously polluted. Toxic industrial wastes discharged into rivers and lakes or into wells also permeate aquifers, making water -- both surface and underground -- unsafe for drinking.
The current engineering concept for dealing with human waste is to use vast quantities of water to wash it away, preferably into a sewer system, where it may or may not be treated before being discharged into the local river. The "flush and forget" system takes nutrients originating in the soil and typically dumps them into the nearest body of water. Not only are the nutrients lost from agriculture, but the nutrient overload has contributed to the death of many rivers and to the formation of some 405 "dead zones" in ocean coastal regions. This outdated system is expensive and water-intensive, disrupts the nutrient cycle, and can be a major source of disease and death. Worldwide, poor sanitation and personal hygiene claim the lives of some 2 million children per year, a toll that is one-third the size of the 6 million lives claimed by hunger and malnutrition.
Sunita Narain of the Center for Science and Environment in India argues convincingly that a water-based disposal system with sewage treatment facilities is neither environmentally nor economically viable for India. She notes that an Indian family of five, producing 250 liters of excrement in a year and using a water flush toilet, contaminates 150,000 liters of water when washing away its wastes.
As currently designed, India’s sewer system is actually a pathogen-dispersal system. It takes a small quantity of contaminated material and uses it to make vast quantities of water unfit for human use. With this system, Narain says, both "our rivers and our children are dying." India’s government, like that of many developing countries, is hopelessly chasing the goal of universal water-based sewage systems and sewage treatment facilities -- unable to close the huge gap between services needed and provided, but unwilling to admit that it is not an economically viable option.
Fortunately, there is a low-cost alternative: the composting toilet. This is a simple, waterless, odorless toilet linked to a small compost facility and sometimes a separate urine collecting facility. Collected urine can be trucked to nearby farms, much as fertilizer is. The dry composting converts human fecal material into a soil-like humus, which is essentially odorless and is scarcely 10 percent of the original volume. These facilities need to be emptied every year or so, depending on design and size. Vendors periodically collect the humus and market it as a soil supplement, thus ensuring that the nutrients and organic matter return to the soil, reducing the need for energy-intensive fertilizer.
This technology sharply reduces residential water use compared with flush toilets, thus cutting water bills and lowering the energy needed to pump and purify water. As a bonus, it also reduces garbage flow if table wastes are incorporated, eliminates the sewage water disposal problem, and restores the nutrient cycle. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now lists several brands of dry compost toilets approved for use. Pioneered in Sweden, these toilets work well under the widely varying conditions in which they are now used, including Swedish apartment buildings, U.S. private residences, and Chinese villages. For many of the 2.5 billion people who lack improved sanitation facilities, composting toilets may be the answer.
Rose George, author of The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters, reminds us why the "flush and forget" system is an energy guzzler. One, it takes energy to deliver large quantities of drinking-quality water (up to 30 percent of household water usage is for flushing). Two, it takes energy -- and lots of it -- to operate a sewage treatment facility.
In summary, there are several reasons why the advanced design composting toilets deserve top priority: spreading water shortages, rising energy prices, rising carbon emissions, shrinking phosphate reserves, a growing number of sewage-fed oceanic dead zones, the rising healthcare costs of sewage-dispersed intestinal diseases, and the rising capital costs of "flush and forget" sewage disposal systems.
Once a toilet is separated from the water use system, recycling household water becomes a much simpler process. For cities, the most effective single step to raise water productivity is to adopt a comprehensive water treatment/recycling system, reusing the same water continuously. With this system, which is much simpler if sewage is not included in the waste water, only a small percentage of water is lost to evaporation each time it cycles through. Given the technologies that are available today, it is quite possible to recycle the urban water supply indefinitely, largely removing cities as a claimant on scarce water resources.
cont.Theodore Roosevelt once noted that "civilized people ought to know how to dispose... more
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Maude Barlow gave this stirring plenary speech, full of hope even in the face of ecological disasters, to the Environmental Grantmakers Association annual retreat in Pacific Grove, California. Barlow, a former UN Senior Water Advisor, is National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians and founder of the Blue Planet Project. Barlow is a contributor to AlterNet's forth-coming book Water Matters: Why We Need to Act Now to Save Our Most Critical Resource.
We all know that the earth and all upon it face a growing crisis. Global climate change is rapidly advancing, melting glaciers, eroding soil, causing freak and increasingly wild storms, and displacing untold millions from rural communities to live in desperate poverty in peri-urban slums. Almost every human victim lives in the global South, in communities not responsible for greenhouse gas emissions. The atmosphere has already warmed up almost a full degree in the last several decades and a new Canadian study reports that we may be on course to add another 6 degrees Celsius (10.8 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100.
Half the tropical forests in the world – the lungs of our ecosystems – are gone; by 2030, at the current rate of harvest, only 10% will be left standing. Ninety percent of the big fish in the sea are gone, victim to wanton predatory fishing practices. Says a prominent scientist studying their demise “there is no blue frontier left.” Half the world’s wetlands – the kidneys of our ecosystems – were destroyed in the 20th century. Species extinction is taking place at a rate one thousand times greater than before humans existed. According to a Smithsonian scientist, we are headed toward a “biodiversity deficit” in which species and ecosystems will be destroyed at a rate faster than Nature can create new ones.
We are polluting our lakes, rivers and streams to death. Every day, 2 million tons of sewage and industrial and agricultural waste are discharged into the world’s water, the equivalent of the weight of the entire human population of 6.8 billion people. The amount of wastewater produced annually is about six times more water than exists in all the rivers of the world. A comprehensive new global study recently reported that 80% of the world’s rivers are now in peril, affecting 5 billion people on the planet. We are also mining our groundwater far faster than nature can replenish it, sucking it up to grow water-guzzling chemical-fed crops in deserts or to water thirsty cities that dump an astounding 200 trillion gallons of land-based water as waste in the oceans every year. The global mining industry sucks up another 200 trillion gallons, which it leaves behind as poison. Fully one third of global water withdrawals are now used to produce biofuels, enough water to feed the world. A recent global survey of groundwater found that the rate of depletion more than doubled in the last half century. If water was drained as rapidly from the Great Lakes, they would be bone dry in 80 years.
The global water crisis is the greatest ecological and human threat humanity has ever faced. As vast areas of the planet are becoming desert as we suck the remaining waters out of living ecosystems and drain remaining aquifers in India, China, Australia, most of Africa, all of the Middle East, Mexico, Southern Europe, US Southwest and other places. Dirty water is the biggest killer of children; every day more children die of water borne disease than HIV/AIDS, malaria and war together. In the global South, dirty water kills a child every three and a half seconds. And it is getting worse, fast. By 2030, global demand for water will exceed supply by 40%— an astounding figure foretelling of terrible suffering.
Knowing there will not be enough food and water for all in the near future, wealthy countries and global investment, pension and hedge funds are buying up land and water, fields and forests in the global South, creating a new wave of invasive colonialism that will have huge geo-political ramifications. Rich investors have already bought up an amount of land double the size of the United Kingdom in Africa alone.
We Simply Cannot Continue on the Present Path
I do not think it possible to exaggerate the threat to our earth and every living thing upon it. Quite simply we cannot continue on the path that brought us here. Einstein said that problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them. While mouthing platitudes about caring for the earth, most of our governments are deepening the crisis with new plans for expanded resource exploitation, unregulated free trade deals, more invasive investment, the privatization of absolutely everything and unlimited growth. This model of development is literally killing the planet.
cont.Maude Barlow gave this stirring plenary speech, full of hope even in the face of... more
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October 15, this Friday is Blog Action Day when thousands of voices across the Internet speak out for one important issue affecting us all. This year the issue is water, and it could not be a more important and crucial issue. From climate change, pollution, to privitization water is quickly becoming a resource we will have less of if we continue to ignore this defining issue of our future and that will leave us without a future. My blog will be participating in this and I hope if you have one you will sign up as well.October 15, this Friday is Blog Action Day when thousands of voices across the... more
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It is widely acknowledged that greenhouse gas emission-fueled climate change is having a profound and negative impact on fresh water systems around the world. Warmer weather causes more rapid evaporation of lakes and rivers, reduced snow and ice cover on open water systems, and melting glaciers.
What is less understood is that our collective abuse and displacement of fresh water is also a serious cause of climate change and global warming. If we are to successfully address climate change, it is time to include an analysis of how our abuse of water is an additional factor in the creation of global warming as well as solutions that protect water and watersheds.
There are two major factors. The first is the actual displacement of water from where it is sustaining a healthy ecosystem as well as healthy hydrologic cycles. Because humanity has polluted so much surface water on the planet, we are now mining the groundwater far faster than it can be replaced by nature. New Scientist reports of a “little-heralded crisis” all over Asia as a result of the exponential drilling of groundwater. Water is moved from where nature has put it in watershed and aquifers (where we can access it) to other place where it is used for flood irrigation and food production – where much of it lost to evaporation – or to supply the voracious thirst of mega cities, where it is usually dumped as waste into the ocean.
AUTHOR: Maude Barlow, former senior advisor to the UN on water issues, is co-author of the bestseller Blue Gold (New Press) and chairperson of the Council of Canadians.
Water is also lost to ecosystems through global trade – water used in the in the production of crops or manufactured goods that are then exported (known as virtual trade in water). Over 20% of daily water used for human purpose is exported out of watersheds in this way. Water is also piped across long distances for industry leaving behind parched landscapes.
The second factor is the removal of the vegetation needed for a healthy hydrologic cycle. Urbanization, deforestation and wetland destruction greatly destroy water-retentive landscapes and lead to the loss of precipitation over the affected area.
Slovakian scientist Michal Kravcik and his colleagues explain that the living world influences the climate mainly by regulating the water cycle and the huge energy flows linked to it. Transpiring plants, especially forests, work as a kind of biotic pump, causing humid air to be sucked out of the ocean and transferred to dry land. If the vegetation is removed from the land, this natural system of biosphere regulation is interrupted. Soil erodes, reducing the content of organic material in the ground, thus reducing its ability to hold water. Dry soil from lost vegetation traps solar heat, sharply increasing the local temperature and causing a reduction in precipitation over the affected area. This process also destroys the natural sequestration of carbon in the soil, leading to carbon loss.
Of course, these two factors are deeply related. Just as removing vegetation from an ecosystem will dry up the soil, so too will removing water from an ecosystem mean reduced or non-existent vegetation.
Taken together, these two factors are hastening the desertification of the planet, and intensifying global warming. Even if we successfully address and reverse greenhouse gas emissions and our dependence on fossil fuels, Kravcik says, we will not be able to stop climate change if we do not deal with the impact of our abuse of water on the planet.
Unless we collectively address the crisis of fresh water and our cavalier treatment of the world’s water systems, we will not restore the climate to health.It is widely acknowledged that greenhouse gas emission-fueled climate change is having... more
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Six days ago, the Summit on the Summit (SOTS) expedition departed on a mission to conquer the world’s largest freestanding mountain: Mount Kilimanjaro. The 50 mile hike to the 19,340 ft peak led the 14 person team of celebrities, educators, activists including including American actors Emile Hirsch and Jessica Biel, on a trek through high winds, snow, sleet, hail and rain. The expedition, led by Grammy-nominated musician and social activist, Kenna, was made as part of an ambitious effort to raise awareness and promote action to end the global water crisis which affects more than a billion people who lack access to clean water.
http://www.causecast.org/news_items/9481-summit-on-the-summit-celeb-climbers-conquer-kilimanjaroSix days ago, the Summit on the Summit (SOTS) expedition departed on a mission to... more
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FACT: More than 3,500,000 people die every year from water-related diseases.
FACT: Every 15 seconds, a child dies from PREVENTABLE water-borne related illness.
FACT: Nearly a billion people are without SAFE DRINKING WATER.
UNEP, Kenyan government launch fund to save Mau (Kenya Broadcasting Corporation) - The government of Kenya in conjunction with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has launched a multi million dollar appeal to save the Mau Forests Complex.
The appeal aims at mobilizing resources for the rehabilitation of the Mau, the largest closed-canopy forest ecosystem in Kenya covering over 400,000 hectares - the size of Mount Kenya and the Aberdares combined.
UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said: “The Mau Complex is of critical importance for sustaining current and future ecological, social and economic development in Kenya. The rehabilitation of the ecosystem will require substantial resources and political goodwill. UNEP is privileged to work in partnership with the Government of Kenya towards the implementation of this vital project.”
The strategic importance of the Mau Forest lies in the ecosystem services it provides to Kenya and the region, including river flow regulation, flood mitigation, water storage, reduced soil erosion, biodiversity, carbon sequestration, carbon reservoir and micro-climate regulation.
Speaking during the launch Prime Minister lauded Steiner and UNEP for the support provided in the recovery of the water catchment area.
{please follow link for more - http://water.org/2009/09/un-and-kenya-launch-an-appeal-to-save-mau/}FACT: More than 3,500,000 people die every year from water-related diseases.
FACT:... more
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Yes, I know it sounds ridiculous.Just because a bunch of people use certain words to express themselves in fora(forums) doesn't mean that they're in some way foretelling the future,but...,but fact is that Cliff High was able to predict a number of specific and major events.Well, you'll be the judge of it! No wait, let time be the judge of it!Yes, I know it sounds ridiculous.Just because a bunch of people use certain words to... more
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Is it the final curtain for the Fertile Crescent? This summer, as Turkish dams reduce the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to a trickle, farmers abandon their desiccated fields across Iraq and Syria, and efforts to revive the Mesopotamian marshes appear to be abandoned, climate modellers are warning that the current drought is likely to become permanent. The Mesopotamian cradle of civilisation seems to be returning to desert.
Last week, Iraqi ministers called for urgent talks with upstream neighbours Turkey and Syria, after the combination of a second year of drought and dams in those countries cut flow on the Euphrates as it enters Iraq to below 250 cubic metres a second. That is less than a quarter the flow needed to maintain Iraqi agriculture.
Tensions have been growing since May, when the Iraqi parliament refused to approve a new much-needed trade deal with Turkey unless it contained binding clauses on river flows. But Turkey appears in no mood to compromise. In July, it announced the final go-ahead for yet another dam, the Ilisu on the Tigris.Is it the final curtain for the Fertile Crescent? This summer, as Turkish dams reduce... more
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Hopes that the 10 Nile Basin countries would sign a water-sharing agreement at a meeting in Alexandria to settle one of the planet's most contentious water issues have been dashed — for now at least — after Egypt and Sudan rejected any cuts in their traditional quotas.
But the prospects of a long-term accord on an equitable share-out of the waters of the 3,470-mile Nile, the world's longest river, remain dim, largely because Egypt, the largest user, refuses to surrender its veto powers and its historic rights over the river that has been its lifeblood since time immemorial.
The Nile and its tributaries flow through Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi.
The water ministers of these states put off finalizing a treaty for six months when they wrapped up their four-day Alexandria meeting on Tuesday.
In May, the riparian states had drafted a Cooperative Framework Agreement at a summit in the Congo, but Egypt and Sudan refused to sign because it made no mention of their historic claims on Nile water that date back to the colonial era.
Cairo and Khartoum, which do not see eye-to-eye on most things, hailed Tuesday's postponement. "It's a big victory," a senior Sudanese official declared. "They were going to sign the agreement beginning Aug. 1 regardless of Egypt and Sudan."
The dispute over the Nile's life-giving waters has stirred resentment and tension for years now. But now the feuding over water appears to be intensifying.
Some international law experts have gone so far as to suggest that if political and diplomatic efforts fail to settle the issue, the use of military force would be the only option.
Others say it is unlikely that any of these states would resort to such extreme action. But the U.N. Development Program recently voiced concern that conflict over shrinking water resources could trigger "water wars" — as has happened before in the arid Middle East.
Climate change in recent years has reduced rainfall, leading to lower water flows in the Nile and jeopardizing hydraulic projects in several states.
Egypt and neighboring Sudan are the Nile's largest consumers. Egypt, which lies at the end of the river as it flows into the Mediterranean, does not contribute any water to the Nile system.Hopes that the 10 Nile Basin countries would sign a water-sharing agreement at a... more
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Even after all that has happened and is happening globally regarding environmental factors and climate change, Americans are still under the impression that we are not vulnerable to that which now effects the developing world. I think this ignorance is what fuels much of the inaction regarding water issues and climate change in America. It needs to change. Now.Even after all that has happened and is happening globally regarding environmental... more
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St. Thomas which was a city covered by Lake Mead due to Hoover Dam construction is now exposed due to recession of water levels. To some that may seem like justice because of what was done to St. Thomas originally because of the dam construction, but now this lake which is one of the largest has millions of people dependent on it for water. So now, those in this area who once lost all due to the water coming in may well see that again because of the opposite effect. This is a stark example of what population increases and climate change combined with waste can lead to. It should be a lesson to us all.
From article:
All reservoirs along the Colorado River might dry up by mid-century as the West warms, a new study finds. The probability of such a severe shortage by then runs as high as one-in-two, unless current water-management practices change, the researchers report.
The study's coauthors looked at the effects of a range of reductions in Colorado River stream flow on future reservoir levels and at the implications of different management strategies.
Even under the harshest drying caused by climate change, the large storage capacity of reservoirs on the Colorado might help sustain water supply for a few decades. However, new water management approaches are critical to minimize the chances of fully depleting reservoir storage by mid-century.
"This study, along with others that predict future flow reductions in the Colorado River Basin, suggests that water managers should begin to re-think current water management practices during the next few years, before the more serious effects of climate change appear," says lead study author Balaji Rajagopalan of the University of Colorado in Boulder (CU-Boulder).
The findings by Rajagopalan and his colleagues have been accepted by the journal Water Resources Research, published by the American Geophysical Union (AGU).
The Colorado River system is enduring its 10th year of a drought. Fortunately, the river system entered the drought in 2000, with the reservoirs at approximately 95 percent of capacity. The reservoir system is currently at 59 percent of capacity, about the same as this time last year, says Rajagopalan. Roughly 30 million people depend on the Colorado River for drinking and irrigation water.
The research team examined the future vulnerability of the system to water supply variability coupled with projected changes in water demand. They found that through 2026, the risk of fully depleting reservoir storage in any given year remains below 10 percent under any scenario of climate fluctuation or management alternative. During this period, the reservoir storage could even recover from its current low level, according to the researchers.
But if climate change results in a 10 percent reduction in the Colorado River's average stream flow as some recent studies predict, the chances of fully depleting reservoir storage will exceed 25 percent by 2057, according to the study. If climate change results in a 20 percent flow reduction, the chances of fully depleting reservoir storage will exceed one in two by 2057, Rajagopalan says.
"On average, drying caused by climate change would increase the risk of fully depleting reservoir storage by nearly ten times more than the risk we expect from population pressures alone," Rajagopalan says.
"By mid-century this risk translates into a 50 percent chance in any given year of empty reservoirs, an enormous risk and huge water management challenge," he says.
The river hosts more than a dozen dams along its 2,330-kilometer (1,450-mile) journey from Colorado's Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of California.
end of excerpt.St. Thomas which was a city covered by Lake Mead due to Hoover Dam construction is now... more
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There is no more stark a depiction of man's footprint on Earth than the rapid decline of the Aral Sea.
Excerpt:
These Envisat images highlight the dramatic retreat of the Aral Sea’s shoreline from 2006 to 2009. The Aral Sea was once the world’s fourth-largest inland body of water, but it has been steadily shrinking over the past 50 years since the rivers that fed it were diverted for irrigation projects.
By the end of the 1980s, it had split into the Small Aral Sea (north), located in Kazakhstan, and the horse-shoe shaped Large Aral Sea (south), shared by Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
By 2000, the Large Aral Sea had split into two – an eastern and western lobe. As visible in the images, the eastern lobe retreated substantially between 2006 and 2009. It appears to have lost about 80% of its water since the 2006 acquisition, at which time the eastern lobe had a length of about 150 km and a width of about 70 km.
The sea’s entire southern section is expected to dry out completely by 2020, but efforts are underway to save the northern part.
The Kok-Aral dike, a joint project of the World Bank and the Kazakhstan government, was constructed between the northern and southern sections of the sea to prevent water flowing into the southern section. Since its completion in 2005, the water level has risen in the northern section by an average of 4 m.
As the Aral Sea evaporated, it left behind a 40 000 sq km zone of dry, white salt terrain now called the Aral Karakum Desert. Each year violent sandstorms pick up at least 150 000 tonnes of salt and sand from the Aral Karakum and transport it across hundreds of km, causing severe health problems for the local population and making regional winters colder and summers hotter. In an attempt to mitigate these effects, vegetation that thrives in dry, saline conditions is being planted in the former seabed.
In 2007, the Kazakhstan government secured another loan from the World Bank to implement the second stage, which includes the building of a second dam, of the project aimed at reversing this man-made environmental disaster.There is no more stark a depiction of man's footprint on Earth than the rapid... more
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This is truly a moral issue.
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Evian Natural Spring Water is looking to break-dancing babies to energize its brand. The upscale water brand this week is launching its new “Live young” global advertising campaign. The ads, which will appear online in the U.S. and on TV in some overseas markets, look to project the brand's values of health, youth and purity in a more playful way than in the past.
Evian has been struggling during the recession in the U.S. Its sales volume sank 17 percent in 2008, per Beverage Digest. Evian holds only 0.6 percent of the bottled water market. With its high price, premium brands of bottled water like Evian are showing dwindling returns, said John Sicher, editor of Beverage Digest. “Evian has been flattish to down in recent years mainly because the category has moved more towards mid- to low-price brands.”
Evian is hoping for a viral hit on the Web to launch the campaign in the U.S. It is posting the ad on YouTube as well as initiating a new Web site www.evianliveyoung.com dedicated to the campaign. Visitors can view two videos, digital teasers of break-dancing babies and “making-of” clips. “Interviews” with a few of the 96 babies filmed will be available, as well as links to Facebook pages created for the infants.
In the ad, the message “Let’s observe the effect of Evian on your body” appears, followed by lively and happy babies break-dancing on roller skates to a remix of the classic track “Rapper’s Delight” by hip-hop producer Dan the Automater. Euro RSCG is the agency.
“The Web today has changed the way we communicate and in launching this campaign virally it allows Evian, a global brand, to reach consumers worldwide in a way that traditional media cannot,” said Jerome Goure, vice president of marketing for Danone Waters of America, the importer and marketer of Evian in North America.Evian Natural Spring Water is looking to break-dancing babies to energize its brand.... more
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