Posts by Jared Simpson

Jared Simpson is a blogger for Waterblogged.Info

Peter Gleick: How to Save California from Water Crisis
Posted by Jared Simpson, Waterblogged.Info on January 6, 2009 at 5:00 AM.

What do the water crisis, Dante’s Inferno, Hollywood movies, Sandra Bullock, the Mars Rover, cholera, have in common?  Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute , arguably America’s foremost water expert, connects the unlikely dots in this fascinating recent talk at UC Berkeley.

You can skip the introductory remarks and go to 20:00 to hear Gleick being introduced. While his talk focused on California, Gleick puts the state’s problem in a global context, which makes this a good general introduction world water woes.

The good news is that California has plenty of water–scarcity is not the problem. At about 38:30, Gleick starts identifying the factors standing in the way of assuring that all Californian’s have access to clean and affordable water.

Your Summer Reading List for Water
Posted by Jared Simpson, Waterblogged.Info on July 10, 2008 at 9:52 AM.

All titles are linked to Powell's Books of Portland, Oregon. Powell's listings have a synopsis of each book.

Every Drop for Sale by Jeffrey Rothfeder-Excellently researched, passionately written. A great introduction to the global water crisis. We've referenced it in It's a drought, stupid! pt. 3: Georgia and the Chattahoochee River and Controlled Fury.

When the Rivers Run Dry by Fred Pearce-Another fine and passionate introduction to global water woes and worries by a noted expert. We cited it in our second post Ten not-so-fun facts about water, The amazing disappearing lakes, pt. 2: The Aral Sea, Dam Demolition Derby: three down, 74,997 to go, and Desalination back in the day.

The Great Lakes Water Wars by Peter Annin-All, (maybe more than you need) to know about the Great Lakes. From the synopsis: Will we divert water from the Great Lakes, causing them to end up like Central Asia's Aral Sea, which has lost 90 percent of its surface area and 75 percent of its volume since 1960? We've cited it in numerous posts, most directly in The Great Lakes Water Wars!, wherein we discuss the dubious practice of referring to water disputes as wars.

To the Last Drop: A Novel of Water, Oppression, and Rebellion by Andrew Wice-Texas invades New Mexico in this prolific young author's fictional account of a fiercely fought water war in the Southwest. Those who like fun and facts mixed with their fiction will definitely not be disappointed. Download Pt. 1 from the book's site.

Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the Eastern U.S. by Cynthia Barnett-Barnett is a noted journalist and water expert. From the publisher's comments in Powell's synopsis:"With lively prose and a journalist's eye for a good story, Cynthia Barnett offers a sobering account of water scarcity problems facing Florida-one of our wettest states-and the rest of the East Coast."

Will Desalination Take Off in California?
Posted by Jared Simpson, Waterblogged.Info on May 21, 2008 at 2:29 PM.

The Waterblogged.info team finds itself in the unusual position of praising a local (San Francisco) television station for its coverage.

Taking a break from petty crime, murders, fires, and traffic accidents, San Francisco's ABC affiliate, KGO offers <A Look at the Desalination Process, an informative video update on the state-of-the-art of desalination efforts in water-challenged California.

Of particular interest are the numerous small desal plants that pepper the coast that have been deployed to test the concept. They work, but they are currently delivering a meaningless minuscule percentage of the water requirements for the communities they serve. The KGO reporter does not gush about the potential; desalinated ocean water is and will be very expensive and otherwise problematic (think lots of dead and otherwise threatened coastal and sea life) for the foreseeable future.

We have dutifully added this resource to our ever-growing page of desalination resources: Getting Serious with Waterblogged.info: Desalination. Included in that compendium is a narrated slide show called A Tour of Tampa Bay's Desalination Plant, written and narrated by a journalist who specializes in water issues, Cynthia Barnett.

Everything You Need to Know About Water Privatization
Posted by Jared Simpson, Waterblogged.Info on February 19, 2008 at 2:07 PM.

Today we proudly launch Getting serious with Waterblogged.info: Water Privatization a page of web resources related to the question of whether small groups of people should be permitted to own and control the elixir of life and disseminate it to the rest of the globe for their personal gain. Obviously, we don't think so, but we feel compelled -- like the wimpy-assed, fair-minded liberals we are -- to present resources supporting both sides of the argument.

Below are more links to water privatization resources than you can shake a water-divining rod at. This will be regularly updated. No, really, it will.

Water Privatization - Fact Pack
A "fact pack" from the State Environmental Resource Center (meaning a resource for all states) is a good a place to start as any to get basic information about the history of and prospects for water privatization in the U.S. (It hasn't been updated since 2004, but most of the info is still useful.)

Pacific Institute: Topics - Water Privatization
Pacific Institute: Topics - Water Privatization California-based think tank provides timely and common-sense analysis. Typical of their approach, they take a middle-of-the-road, grant-funding-agency-friendly approach to privatization.

AlterNet: Tags: water privatization
Stories, blog posts, and videos tagged as "water privatization" from a politically progressive news site.

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Newsletter Explains How to Profit from World Water Shortage
Posted by Jared Simpson, Waterblogged.Info on January 15, 2008 at 6:03 PM.

"The Earth's Most Precious Resource May Be the 21st Century's Most Lucrative Investment! Here's How To Profit from the Coming Fresh Water Shortage!"

What really ticks off the admittedly self-righteous and sometimes easily-provoked Waterblogged.info editorial staff? People like Jeff Siegal, managing editor of the Green Chip Review newsletter, and author of the giddy opening sentences.

Siegal's newsletter-absolutely FREE (Siegal's caps, not ours) -- will give the lucky subscriber (who is, thanks to Siegal's largesse, under absolutely no obligation, ever!) "the foresight and vision to exploit the investment opportunities of a post-oil economy."

Railing against the privatization of water resources at this juncture is pointless. We're talking juggernaut here, in every sense of the word (Well, except this one.

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