“Water is essential for all dimensions of life.  Over the past few decades, use of water has increased, and in many places water availability is falling to crisis levels. More than eighty countries, with forty percent of the world’s population, are already facing water shortages, while in this century the world’s population will double. The costs of water infrastructure have risen dramatically. The quality of water in rivers and underground has deteriorated, due to pollution by waste and contaminants from cities, industry and agriculture. Ecosystems are being destroyed, sometimes permanently. Over one billion people lack safe water, and three billion lack sanitation; eighty per cent of infectious diseases are waterborne, killing millions of children each year.”                          

                                                               World Bank Institute

  We owe our children, and theirs—a sustainable future. 

          We owe our planet-home reasonable and responsible behavior that complies with the laws of nature.  As the most prolific species on earth, are we facing our realities? 

          First question:  what provides the most important aspect of human existence? Answer: clean water!

          The latest warning signs manifested at Lake Lanier, Georgia in November 2007.  One reported said to ABC’s World News Tonight anchor Charlie Gibson, “They need a lot of rain because they’re down to the last 36 days of supply for the Atlanta area.”

          “How much rain?” Gibson shot back.

          “Four months of rain would be a good start,” the reporter said.

          If ever a wake-up call, the vanishing waters of Lake Lanier portend water shortages for five million people—today! Nonetheless, the Peach State expects to grow from 8.2 million people in 2009 to 16.4 million by 2050. Hello!  Knock, knock!  Anybody home?

          Two thousand miles west of Georgia, Charles Gibson on a February 8, 2008 broadcast, said, “Scientists say Lake Mead, which provides water for millions in the west, expects to go dry by 2023.  It’s caused by drought, climate change and human population growth.”

          On February 21, 2008, anchor Brian Williams at NBC reported that Georgia legislators wanted to extend that state’s northern border two miles north in order to annex the Tennessee River.  That would allow them to stick a big pipe into a new water source.

          As Goober of “Mayberry RFD” might say, “That’s like tryin’ to milk a cow while sittin’ on a stool six feet away. ‘Bout the only thing you gonna’ get is a tail swishin’ full of…well Sheriff Taylor, you know what I mean.”

          “Yeah, I know what ya’ mean Goob,” Andy said.

          Colorado State University Professor Neil S. Grigg wrote in the Denver Post, “Not a Drop to Spare,” February 17, 2008, said, “Colorado’s water supplies are nearing their limits, and there is little hope for new sources. What’s next?”

          None of those experts reported that Georgia’s current population of 8.2 million would double to 16.4 million in four decades.  Colorado expects to double from 4.6 to 9.8 million.  California expects to add 20 million in 30 years.  Never once did any of the experts pin the needle on the population donkey!  It makes you wonder; who made hyper-population a sacred, untouchable cow? Why?  Who do they expect to benefit? 

Growth and rampant population

As you appreciate, ‘carrying capacity’ becomes the most important phrase in our 21st century vocabulary.  It entails the amount of human and animal life a limited area of land can sustain in perpetuity. 

          As this population overload advances, we face major water dilemmas.

          “While America remains in her ‘consensus trance’ brought on by decades of unlimited growth and resources, her citizens cannot imagine water shortages,” said the author of “The Long Emergency” James Howard Kunstler.  “The vast majority of the earth’s surface consists of water, yet only three percent of that is fresh water.  The World Bank famously declared, “The wars of the twenty-first century will be fought over water.”    

          Kunstler continued, “The United Nations identified three hundred zones around the world that will be the sites of conflicts over water in the years ahead.  The great aquifers of North America, China and India are all depleting rapidly due to aggressive irrigation…the rapidly diminishing supplies of fresh water, especially in the heavily populated third world, also exacerbate sanitation catastrophes, and prepare the stage for epidemic disease. More than two million people worldwide die every year from contaminated water. In the Maquiladora zones of Mexico today, water is so scarce that babes and children drink Coca-Cola instead.”

          In a September 30, 2006 Rocky Mountain News report, Boulder, Colorado scientists predicted grim drought forecasts for the West.  To support their claim, they used eighteen of the world’s most powerful computer climate models.  Martin Hoerling of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said, “Climate change is moving us in the direction of a perpetual state that is of the Dust Bowl type.” 

          Scientists expect increased evaporation and drier soils leading to more severe and frequent droughts. Hoerling said, “Droughts could be 25 percent worse than the 1930s Dust Bowl days.” 

          Who stands to suffer the greatest risk?  In 2009, citizens of  Utah, Arizona, Nevada and California downstream of the Colorado River devour 13.5 million acre feet of the river.  That’s millions of people!  Bob Reynolds of NOAA said, “We’re going to have to adapt our survival strategies to coping with less water.”

My question is: how will we adapt when we’ve added 100 million people in the next three decades?  Why not choose a steady population now so we won’t have to adapt, but in fact, flourish with a populace that remains sustainable?

          Associated Press writer James McPherson on July 30, 2006 wrote a piece for the Denver Post, “Without Rain, Dakotas Dry Up.”  He reported, “Fields of wheat, durum and barley in the Dakotas this summer will never end up as pasta or bread…what is left is hot winds blowing clouds of dirt from dried-out ponds.”

          More than 60 percent of the United States suffered abnormally dry or drought conditions in the summer of 2006.  While I traveled 20,300 miles through 48 states in June, July and August of that year--I saw burned up corn and pigmy crops from lack of water.  The drought stretched from Georgia to Arizona and from Montana to Wisconsin.

          Will America experience commensurate rainfall to provide food and water for that added 100 million?  Will we be able to feed and water our 300 million already in the USA?  Can science produce miracle crops that grow without water? 

          Emphatic answer: no!

          According to Mike Matz, “Losing Spaces”, Denver Post, December 23, 2007, American farmland and wetlands vanish at 6,000 acres per day which equals 2.19 million acres annually for new malls, highways and housing. Ground water stores cannot recharge.

          Along with lack of water, we degrade water quality.  Californians buy more filtered water than anywhere else in America.  Why? They can’t provide enough clean water to their 37.5 million residents.  What about polluted and “chemicalized” water run-off.  We spray crops, inject insecticides and apply herbicides onto millions of acres of farmland. It seeps into our groundwater and runs into our rivers.  The Mississippi River spews millions of gallons of fertilizer and chemically poisoned water into the Gulf of Mexico that creates a 10,000 square mile dead zone where few fish or native marine life can survive.  Every river running out of the United States and most industrialized nations carries enormous amounts of poisons.  Acid rain from toxic air pollution falls with every rainstorm.

          With blinders fully in place, we pursue rampant population growth with no concern toward future generations.  Big surprise— people need water to survive.

The World Health Organization reports in 2006, "Thirty-five percent of humanity doesn't have access to clean drinking water."  For a quick reality check, that’s more than two billion people.  Is America immune to water shortages?

Short answer: no!

"Is a multibillion-dollar tax hike that could boost water bills as much as 50 percent again hanging over New York City?" New York Post writer Carl Campanile said.  "The threat comes from the impact of three large upstate real-estate development projects bordering reservoirs that feed the city's drinking-water supply."

Campanile reported, "The state's watershed inspector general, Robert Tierney, raised red flags over these projects:

* A 2,000-acre Catskill Park resort complex surrounding Belleayre Mountain Ski Center could pollute the Ashakon and Pepacton reservoirs.

* A 273-unit housing development and mall in Putnam County could increase pollution in the Croton Reservoir.

* A 104-lot subdivision - also in Putnam - could have a deleterious effect on the Muscott Reservoir.

"These projects are deemed important to upstate economic development.  But at what cost to the city?"

Humans and wildlife stand at risk.

Campanile said, "Pollution, sure to be generated by the developments, likely will prompt the federal Environmental Protection Agency to force New York City to build a water-purification complex costing billions to construct and hundreds of millions annually to operate.

"These costs would be passed directly to property owners.   That would mean hugely inflated water-tax bills for single-family homeowners - particularly in residential Queens and Brooklyn."

Campanile continued, "Even worse would be the impact on owners of rental properties.  Unlike electricity or gas, there is no way to effectively measure per-apartment water use in a single-meter building.  Thus, landlords would be stuck with the full burden of higher water and sewage rates—while being severely restrained by rent regulation from passing the costs along.  This could drive marginal properties into bankruptcy."

Former New York Governor Spitzer who lost his job for one too many visits to late night bordellos, said, "I'll be neutral while trying to negotiate a compromise between the Catskills’ developers and the city's interests."

 Spitzer promised to champion economic development there.

Do you see how this kind of thinking drives our civilization over a cliff?  In the face of water shortages or damages done to rivers as well as the environment, a sitting governor pressed for more development.  That means more destruction of the wild, which, in turn creates a cascading effect on everything in our environment.

Let's further see how ironic, useless and inept our leaders prove themselves as they pretend to face our future water dilemmas caused by overpopulation.  

 Newsweek, April 16, 2007, "Leadership and Environment" interviewed Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger "The Green Giant" with a picture of him puffing on a cigar.  While he filled his lungs with toxic chemicals from the stogie, 37 million Californians' cars, trucks, ships, power plants and homes filled the skies with enormous pollution exhaust.

Arnold promised to reduce California emissions in 2020 by 174 metric tons.

What didn't he promise?  What didn't he address?  What did he ignore?

California expects another added 40 million people, if current immigration trends continue, by 2050, to reach a low of 65 million and a high of 79.1 million. (Source: “US Population Projections for 2050” Fogel/Martin, March 2006)  What does that mean?  It means that nothing will be solved.  Every aspect of California's accelerating consequences will be multiplied by adding 40 million people.

 Later in Newsweek's presentation, they featured mayors of cities across America taking the lead.  Again, none of their actions will work because none addresses the certain negative impacts of adding 100 million people.

Newsweek's Karen Springen wrote another article on the effects of human population in the same issue, "Will Polar Bears Be OK?"  Again, Springen failed to mention human overpopulation or anything about stabilizing humanity’s numbers! 

 Another Newsweek piece by Jessica Ramirez, "How to Live a Greener Life" presented effective methods for curbing billions of metric tons of greenhouse gases created in the US annually.  She prescribed ‘powder puff’ solutions that looked good and made people feel good.  Such “Kool-aide” solutions fail miserably.  She suggested planting a few trees!  As if trees can compete with millions of combustion engines burning 20 million barrels daily!  They cannot! 

Newsweek continued with a report on China's water crisis caused by its staggering 1.3 billion people.  Journalist Orville Schell reported, "The most dramatic national transformation in human history is being threatened by a lack of water.  More than 70 percent of China's rivers are severely polluted.  One can drive a hundred miles in any direction from Beijing and never cross a healthy river.  Many rivers have dried up from human overuse. In 80 percent of rivers still flowing, water quality has been rated 'unfit for human contact' as well as agricultural or industrial use."

Please take note that whatever polluted waters jettison from rivers around the world into our oceans, that contaminated water swirls into every sector of the globe.  No marine plants or creatures can withstand growing concentrations of human-made poisons.

 I've traveled throughout China on my bicycle, up close and personal.  China features wall-to-wall people.  No let up!  No end to it! Accelerating pollution!  Compacted living!  No escape!  Modern Chinese want to imitate Americans; with more and more pollutants.  Vicious circle!

At our current population growth, we follow China and India's disastrous footsteps as we grow toward 1.0 billion people in this century.  Fifty years from now, the same report on China's enormous dilemma will be our nightmare, especially in the West, and throughout the United States.

At least one person in Newsweek's report spoke rationally.  K.R. Sridhar said, "I'm not against conservation, but the idea that we can conserve our way out of this problem will not hold."

 Everything reported in Newsweek reminded me of a vision— Governor Arnold, the great muscleman, jumping into the Colorado River north of I-70 in springtime— with a goal of swimming to its source in the Fraser Valley near the Continental Divide in Colorado.  The scene proves magnificent; his mighty muscles carry him upward, past the torrents of melting water rushing out of the Rocky Mountains. 

Sure enough, the press features him making tremendous progress.  Each day, he puffs on his cigar with confidence in his journey.  However, the mighty Colorado kept adding water to its annual snow-melt runoff.  As Arnold progressed, in reality, rushing water swept him backwards— downstream. 

In the end, even Arnold suffered total defeat by the forces of nature. 

 As you connect the dots in this book, California’s fate becomes America’s future.  If we fail to take aggressive steps to address the root-cause, hyper-population, we crash, no matter how much we pretend to make progress.

Water?  No longer pure!  No longer clean!  Dangerously polluted!   No longer ample!