For some reason this article I had read a while back stuck with me. I remember at the time being struck by the fact that the assessment of the area where I live, despite the fact that the water infrastructure here is based on a dam and an aqueduct is often touted as a great achievement, is in fact a dire mess. It is not secure and it is also a major threat to the ecology of the region.
At the time there was an issue on the ballot to reconsider whether the dam/aqueduct system should be dismantled. Of course if that were done it would totally disrupt the lives of millions who now live here. The amount of fresh water naturally available is ridiculously low to even come close to sustaining the burgeoning population here. A lot of money was pumped into the campaign against the plan to reassess the dam/aqueduct and the proponents were made out to look like fanatics.
However the proposal is based on very sound science. Hence this article which I remember reading and which is one of many studies available on the dire problems with fresh water availability facing the world.
The massive infrastructure projects of the past century while seemingly spectacular, are highly misguided and the authors advise:
Writing in the journal Nature, they say that in western countries, conserving water for people through reservoirs and dams works for people, but not nature.
They urge developing countries not to follow the same path.
Instead, they say governments should invest in water management strategies that combine infrastructure with “natural” options such as safeguarding watersheds, wetlands and flood plains.
source: BBC: “Water map shows billions at risk of ‘water insecurity’”
The bottom line is that humans should not alter wetlands and rivers. It harms the environment and does not provide ultimate water security. Instead humans have to learn how to plan and create their environments in harmony with existing sources of water.
see also: site: Rivers in Crisis
Download the full study here: Global Water System Project http://www.gwsp.org/fileadmin/documents_news/nature09440.pdf
…water [is] the preeminent building block of the Earth system and of critical necessity to human prosperity. At the same time, humans are rapidly embedding themselves into the basic character of the water cycle without full knowledge of the consequences. Major sources of water system change include mismanagement and overuse, river flow distortion, pollution, watershed disturbance, invasive species, and greenhouse warming. Defining the collective significance of such change remains in our view a grand challenge…
source: GWSP: “Future Scenarios on Human Water Security Threats”
…vast areas across both the developed and developing world arrive at similarly acute levels of imposed threat to their freshwater resources. Sources of degradation in many of the developing world’s most threatened rivers bear striking similarities to those of rivers in similar condition in wealthy countries. However, the highly engineered solutions practiced traditionally by industrialized nations, which emphasize treatment of the symptoms rather than protection of resources, often prove too costly for poorer nations.
Reliance of wealthy nations on costly technological remedies to overcome their water problems and deliver water services does little to abate the underlying threats, producing a false sense of security in industrialized nations and perilous water insecurity in the developing world. In addition, lack of comparable investments to conserve biodiversity, regardless of national wealth, help to explain accelerating declines in freshwater species.
source: riverthreat.net
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