Chicago Trib: Brewers worry that national water shortages will raise prices

Brewers worry that national water shortages will raise prices

MILWAUKEE: Even a hint of water scarcity is enough to drive a brewer to drink.

"Simply put, beer is 92 percent water," said Wisconsin Commerce Secretary Richard Leinenkugel, who hails from one of the nation's oldest breweries, the Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co. [read rest of article]

Green, Inc.: Water Use by Solar Projects Intensifies

Water Use by Solar Projects Intensifies

The West’s water wars are likely to intensify with Pacific Gas and Electric’s announcement Monday that the utility will buy 500 megawatts of electricity from two solar power plant projects to be built in the California desert.

The Genesis Solar Energy Project would consume an estimated 536 million gallons of water a year while the Mojave Solar Project would pump 705 million gallons annually for power plant cooling, according to applications filed with the California Energy Commission.

With 35 big solar farm projects undergoing licensing or planned for arid regions of California alone, water is emerging as a contentious issue. [read rest of article]

Clean Technology Forum

This is video from the main segment of the Clean Tech Forum held in San Antonio on Sept. 16, and livecast to the Web by NOWCastSA.

The speakers were: San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro; Steve Bartley, Interim General Manager, CPS Energy; Patrick Moore, Co-Chair, Clean and Safe Energy Coalition (CASEnergy); Craig Severance,Author, Business Risks & Costs of New Nuclear Power and Arjun Makhijani, President, Institute for Energy & Environmental Research.

ABC NEws: From Ecological Soviet-Era Ruin, a Sea Is Reborn

From Ecological Soviet-Era Ruin, a Sea Is Reborn

Standing on the shore under the relentless Central Asian sun, Badarkhan Prikeyev drew on a cigarette and squinted into the distance as one fishing boat after another returned with the day's catch.

Until recently, this spot where the fish merchant was standing, in a man-made desert at the edge of nowhere, represented one of the world's worst environmental calamities.

Now fresh water was lapping at his boots, proclaiming an environmental miracle — the return of the Aral Sea. [Read rest of article]

time4climatejustice

Democracy Now!: Toxic Waters

Toxic Waters: Regulatory Absence Allows Chemical, Coal and Farm Industries to Pollute US Water Supplies

Amy Goodman speaks to New York Times reporter Charles Duhigg about the latest in his investigative series “Toxic Waters,” which examines the worsening pollution in the nation’s water systems. [read transcript]

BBC: China moves 330,000 in water plan

China moves 330,000 in water plan 

China has begun to resettle 330,000 people to make way for a project to divert water from the south of the country to the north, state media say.  [read rest of article]

NPR: How Safe Is Your Drinking Water?

How Safe Is Your Drinking Water?

An estimated one in 10 Americans have been exposed to drinking water that contains dangerous chemicals, parasites, bacteria or viruses, or fails to meet federal health standards. Part of the problem, says journalist Charles Duhigg, is that water-pollution laws are not being enforced. [listen to the segment on Terry Gross - Fresh Air]

Water is as good a comfort food as chocolate, says study

Mother Nature Network:
Water is as good a comfort food as chocolate, says study

Like water for chocolate? Researchers now say that water may be just as effective a comfort food as chocolate, but without the calories. [read rest of article]

USA Today: More projects return America's rivers to their natural state

More projects return America's rivers to their natural state

 Texas. About 31 miles of the San Antonio River were channelized by the Army Corps of Engineers in a project that started in 1957, and "it absolutely does what it was designed to do: It protects our communities from flooding," says Steven Schaner, spokesman for the San Antonio River Authority. Turning the San Antonio into what Schaner describes as a "trapezoidal drainage ditch" came with major effects on the river's ecosystem.

Working with the Army Corps, the authority embarked on the $272 million restoration of 8 miles of the river south of downtown San Antonio. River meanders will be returned, as will shallow rapids important for fish. About 20,000 trees will be planted. [read rest of article]

Water shortages causes 100,000 to flee homes in Iraq: UN

Water shortages causes 100,000 to flee homes in Iraq: UN

PARIS — More than 100,000 people in northern Iraq have abandoned their homes since 2005 because of water stress, after drought and over-extraction of groundwater caused the collapse of an ancient water system, UNESCO said on Tuesday. [read rest of article]

Cleansing the Air at the Expense of Waterways

Cleansing the Air at the Expense of Waterways

Even as a growing number of coal-burning power plants around the nation have moved to reduce their air emissions, many of them are creating another problem: water pollution. Power plants are the nation’s biggest producer of toxic waste, surpassing industries like plastic and paint manufacturing and chemical plants, according to a New York Times analysis of Environmental Protection Agency data. [read rest of article]

video: Sinkhole Recharge

Sinkhole recharge

A series of caves in Stone Oak City Park are part of the recharge zone for the Edwards Aquifer. [View video; sorry, can't embed it!]

Corpus Christi: Red tide found in Packery Channel

Red tide found in Packery Channel

PORT ARANSAS — Red tide was detected late Thursday and early Friday at the mouth of Packery Channel and between the Port Aransas jetties, said a biologist with the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department.

Concentrations of the toxic algae were not high enough to kill fish, but were dense enough to cause minor symptoms such as coughing, throat irritation and watery eyes in people on the beach and jetties, said Meridith Byrd, the department’s Hazardous Algae Bloom response coordinator. [read rest of article]

LA Times: Yemen water crisis builds

Yemen water crisis builds

The resource's scarcity in rural areas sends migrants to swell the capital, which may run out by 2025. [read rest of article]

Montreal Gazette: Fight poverty - add water

Fight poverty - add water

Looking up at the full moon, it's hard to imagine two more different realities: Billionaire Quebec impresario/space tourist Guy Laliberté is up there somewhere - possibly wearing a red clown's nose - floating in zero gravity on a poetic mission about water conservation, while people down here are gathered in a dirt field, waiting for actors to take to a makeshift stage.

The play, also focused on the need for clean drinking water, will be a rare break for people of San Luis, who work hard just to get by. (A third of Nicaraguans live on less than $2 a day). [read rest of article]

Circus Billionaire Hosts Space Show About Water

Canadian space tourist and circus billionaire Guy Laliberte mixed star power, science lectures, music and poetry with water, hosting a TV/Internet show from the International Space Station.

SA-EN: Clean energy, clean water

Clean energy, clean water
By Tom Fowler - Houston Chronicle

HOUSTON — A Texas firm plans to use power generated by the Gulf of Mexico's waves to make its salty water drinkable.

Renew Blue Inc. says its project can address two global problems — climate change and scarce drinking water — by using clean energy to turn seawater to freshwater. [read rest of article]

NASA craft smacks the moon in quest for water

NASA craft smacks the moon in quest for water
By John Johnson Jr. Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

A NASA rocket plowed into a crater on the moon this morning, looking for evidence that water has been lying hidden in the lunar wasteland for billions of years. [read rest of article]

WWF: Wealthy world at risk from water woes elsewhere

Wealthy world at risk from water woes elsewhere

 While German households use 124 litres of water a day directly, individual Germans use 5288 litres of water a day when the water requirements of producing their food, clothes and other consumption items are included.

The report calculated Germany’s water footprint at 159.5 cubic kilometres of water annually, with only half coming from German rain and rivers. [read rest of article]

Minn Post: Noted lecturers grapple with water, 'the uncertain resource'

Noted lecturers grapple with water, 'the uncertain resource'

 "It's certainly no coincidence that whenever civilizations and human activity began, it is essentially because of access to water," Pachauri explained at the start of his address. "And it's also no coincidence that those societies which ran into problems in the management of their water resources — all had to encounter natural debacles that led to the depletion or vanishing of water resources — are the societies that actually failed." [read rest of article]

 

NYT: Regulators Plan to Study Health Risks of Atrazine

Regulators Plan to Study Health Risks of Atrazine
By CHARLES DUHIGG 

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to conduct a new study about the potential health risks of atrazine, a widely used weedkiller that recent research suggests may be more dangerous to humans than previously thought.

Atrazine — a herbicide often used on corn fields, golf courses and even lawns — has become one of the most common contaminants in American drinking water.  [read rest of article]

Going green by growing green

Going green by growing green

 Note: Dr. Murray has just been confirmed as one of the presenters at the Water Symposium!

When San Antonio researcher Kyle Murray peers into the future, he sees the land of black gold turning bright green. Algae green. Murray, an assistant professor of geology at the University of Texas at San Antonio, thinks the city is perfectly poised to become a research and production hotbed for literally one of the greenest fuels around, mined from the slippery marine life that thrives in the shallow ponds and warm, sunny weather that are hallmarks of this region. [read rest of article]

 

Africa Climate Change Threatens Life and Health of Maasai Women

Africa Climate Change Threatens Life and Health of Maasai Women

Kajiado, Kenya: The Maasai are struggling with frequent water shortages which are threatening their way of life. But one women’s group is taking action. [read rest of article]

SA-EN: Big decisions on energy, water dominate mayor's agenda

Big decisions on energy, water dominate mayor's agenda
Scott Stroud

Mayor Julián Castro didn't set out to be “the utility mayor,” but circumstances beyond his control have led him in that direction.

Castro inherited the city's $5.2 billion nuclear decision, and while that work is anything but finished, he's already turning toward another pressing need the city faces — making sure San Antonians have enough water to slake our growing thirst. [read rest of column]

SA-EN: Rain in Brackenridge Park Video

Rains ravaged the area over the weekend, resulting in flash flooding, power outages and more than a few high water rescues. [read rest of article]

Common Dreams: UN Warns of 70 Percent Desertification by 2025

UN Warns of 70 Percent Desertification by 2025

BUENOS AIRES - Drought could parch close to 70 percent of the planet's soil by 2025 unless countries implement policies to slow desertification, a senior United Nations official has warned. [read rest of article]

TIME: World Water Crisis

World Water Crisis
 
In the extraordinary new book Blue Planet Run, hundreds of photographers from all over the world track mankind's vital race to provide safe drinking water to the one billion people who lack it. Watch a slide show of water photos   or download a free copy of the book in PDF format.

Book Review: 'Following the Water': a naturalist's love affair with swamps and their creatures

'Following the Water': a naturalist's love affair with swamps and their creatures

"Following the Water — a Hydromancer's Notebook" by MacArthur "genius grant" award winner David M. Carroll recounts the author's lifelong obsession with the threatened wetlands of his New England home. [read rest of review in the Seattle Times]

The Nation:The Coalfield Uprising

The Coalfield Uprising
By Jeff Biggers

When the Environmental Protection Agency declared this year on September 11 that all pending mountaintop removal mining permits in four Appalachian states stood in violation of the Clean Water Act and required further review, Lora Webb didn’t have time to join in any celebrations. As she and her husband, Steve, a coal miner, packed up their possessions and left his family’s ancestral property outside Lindytown, West Virginia, Lora was more concerned about finding a place to sleep that night. [read rest of article]

AP: Trampling blamed for Alaska walrus deaths

Trampling blamed for Alaska walrus deaths

By Dan Joling - Associated Press 

 

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Trampling likely killed 131 mostly young walruses forced onto the northwest coast of Alaska by a loss of sea ice, according to a preliminary report released Thursday. [read rest of article]

 

NYT Green Blog: Solar Stirs Water Wars in the West

Solar Stirs Water Wars in the West

. . . a water war is breaking out in the desert Southwest over the dozens of large-scale solar power plants planned for the region.

Depending on the technology used, some solar farms can consume more than a billion gallons of water a year in regions that receive three or four inches of rain annually. [read rest of article]