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Wednesday, September 21, 2011
News Who are the real water hogs? It's industry, stupid; particularly the energy industry
Posted By Rhiannon Fionn on Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 8:07 AM
I'm always a little dumbfounded when I see news headlines that include the phrase "conserve water," like this one from WBTV: Communities in Catawba River Basin asked to conserve water.
That's us, by the way: Most of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area is in the Catawba River Basin, and that's the river that 80 percent of the area's drinking water comes from.
Fresh water is a finite resource. It's precious. Without it, civilization crumbles. The end.
So, yeah, turn off the water when you brush your teeth, take short showers (and only when you're actually dirty), don't wash your clothes unless they're actually dirty, don't water the lawn (let that stupid grass dehydrate!), if you must get a car wash go to a place like AutoBell where they recycle the water, etc.
But, also realize that we — you and me, average citizens — aren't the real water hogs. Industry, particularly energy companies, are. Why do you think they build dams to create lakes and place their plants on the water's edge? Duh: They have to have mass quantities of water.
Check this from The New York Times:
“Water and energy are really linked,” said Henrik Larsen, a water policy expert with the DHI Group, a research and consulting firm based in Denmark. “If you save water, you save energy, and vice-versa.”Experts call this the “water-energy nexus.” It takes huge quantities of water to produce electricity from a plant powered by nuclear energy or fossil fuels, and it also takes lots of energy to pump and process the water that irrigates fields and supplies cities.
In the United States, 4 percent of all fresh water is consumed in the energy sector, and 3 percent of all electricity used daily goes toward water and wastewater pumping, distribution and treatment, according to Mike Hightower, a member of the technical staff at Sandia National Laboratories.
A big problem, experts say, is that water is often taken for granted.
Read the entire article, by Kate Galbraith, here. (Subscription may be required.)
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