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  • From: lbsaltzman@aol.com
  • To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Global warming may put U.S. in hot water - Yahoo! News
  • Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2007 16:46:56 -0400

I think we should start taking a serious look at gray water and water
catchement. I think gray water will turn out to be relatively inexpensive
and worth doing before to many years pass. I think that there may be some
simple water catchement that we can do that will also help. I will slowly
research this. I am now convinced that while there maybe some wet years on
average it is going to be worse not better.

-----Original Message-----
From: lfl@intrex.net
To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
Sent: Tue, 17 Apr 2007 12:58 PM
Subject: [permaculture] Global warming may put U.S. in hot water - Yahoo! News



<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/warming_water;_ylt=AjVx4.fyXFrc3dvWLNHZNpVhr7sF>

AP
Global warming may put U.S. in hot water

By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer Tue Apr 17, 6:45 AM ET

WASHINGTON - As the world warms, water — either too little or too much of it

is going to be the major problem for the
United States, scientists and military experts said Monday. It will be a
domestic problem, with states clashing over
controls of rivers, and a national security problem as water shortages and
floods worsen conflicts and terrorism
elsewhere in the world, they said.
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At home, especially in the Southwest, regions will need to find new sources
of
drinking water, the Great Lakes will
shrink, fish and other species will be left high and dry, and coastal areas
will
on occasion be inundated because of
sea-level rises and souped-up storms, U.S. scientists said.

The scientists released a 67-page chapter on North American climate effects,
which is part of an international report on
climate change impact.

Meanwhile, global-warming water problems will make poor, unstable parts of
the
world — the Middle East, Africa and South
Asia — even more prone to wars, terrorism and the need for international
intervention, a panel of retired military
leaders said in a separate report.

"Water at large is the central (global warming) problem for the U.S.,"
Princeton
University geosciences professor
Michael Oppenheimer said after a press conference featuring eight American
scientists who were lead authors of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's climate-effects report.

Roger Pulwarty, one of the federal government's top drought scientists, said
states such as Arizona and Colorado, which
already fight over the Colorado River basin water, will step up legal
skirmishes. They may look to the Great Lakes, but
water availability there will shrink, he said.

Reduced snow melt supplying water for the Sacramento Valley in California
means
that by 2020 there won't be enough water
"to meet the needs of the community," Pulwarty said. That will step-up the
competition for water, he said.

On the East Coast, rising sea levels will make storm surge "the No. 1
vulnerability for the metropolitan East Coast,"
said study lead author Cynthia Rosenzweig of
NASA. "It's a very real threat and needs to be considered for all coastal
development."

Rising sea level can harm Florida's biodiversity and be dangerous during
hurricanes, the scientists added.

A few hours later, retired Gen. Charles F. "Chuck" Wald focused on the same
global warming problem.

"One of the biggest likely areas of conflict is going to be over water," said
Wald, former deputy commander of U.S.
European Command. He pointed to the Middle East and Africa.

The military report's co-author, former Army Chief of Staff Gen. Gordon R.
Sullivan, also pointed to sea-level rise
floods as potentially destabilizing South Asia countries of Pakistan, India,
Bangladesh, Indonesia and Vietnam.

Lack of water and food in places already the most volatile will make those
regions even more unstable with global
warming and "foster the conditions for internal conflicts, extremism and
movement toward increased authoritarianism and
radical ideologies," states the 63-page military report, issued by the CNA
Corp., an Alexandria, Va.-based national
security think tank.

Kristi Ebi, a Virginia epidemiologist on the scientific panel, said reduced
water supplies globally will hinder human
health. "We're seeing mass migration of people because of things like water
resource constraint, and that's certainly a
factor in conflict," she added.

Peter Glieck, president of the Pacific Institute, an Oakland, Calif., think
tank, said the national security and
domestic infighting over water comes as little surprise.

"Water is connected to everything we care about — energy, human health, food
production and politics," said Glieck, who
was not part of either panel. "And that fact alone means we better pay more
attention to the security connections.
Climate will effect all of those things. Water resources are especially
vulnerable to climate change."

As water fights erupt between nations and regions and especially between
cities
and agricultural areas, Stanford
scientist Terry Root said there will be one sure loser low on the priority
list
for water: other species.

"The fish will lose out and the birds and everything," she said.

Pollution will also worsen with global warming, the scientists said.

As places like the Great Lakes draw down on water, the pollution inside will
get
more concentrated and trapped toxins
will come more to the surface, said Stanford scientist Stephen Schneider.

And even the air, especially in the Northeast, will become more deadly. More
heat means more smog cooked and about a 4
to 5 percent increase in smog-related deaths, Ebi said. That's thousands of
people, she said.

The scientists and military leaders held out hope that dramatic cuts in
fossil
fuel emissions could prevent much of the
harm they are predicting. But they said the U.S. government — and the rest of
the world — has to act now.

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