By Dr. Robert Thorson
It was a pleasant summer evening in New England, a backyard barbecue with friends. In the background was the mellifluous sound of water cascading down the face of an old mill dam. On my neck were mosquitoes, sucking my blood and possibly exposing me to West Nile virus, a disease detected in 21 Connecticut towns this year.
Following my wife’s advice, I decided to give thanks. Our blessing of surface fresh water greatly outweighs the curse of insects sharing that resource with us. Things aren’t so blessed in the southern U.S., where record-breaking drought is causing widespread crop failures and major economic disruption, and leaving behind a desiccated landscape with fewer mosquitoes.
No part of New England (according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s climatic data center) is experiencing drought. In contrast, 61 percent of the southeastern United States is experiencing moderate drought or worse, with Georgia taking the strongest hit. Things are much drier in the Southern Plains between Louisiana, south Texas, Arizona and Colorado. There, 84 percent of the land is experiencing at least moderate drought, with 47 percent experiencing exceptional drought.
Climate records are falling by the wayside: more than 6,100 records for warmer-than-usual nights, and 2,740 for hotter-than-usual days. Centered over west-central Texas is the largest footprint ever recorded for “exceptional” drought, based on the U.S. Drought Monitor. Texas is the launching pad for a presidential hopeful who denies that climate is being changed by human influence, and who seems to have forgotten that having a tea party requires water to make the tea.
This year’s drought is exacerbating our already precarious national vulnerability regarding fresh water. Our thirst is “Unquenchable,” based on the recent book by Robert Glennon, a professor of law and public policy at the University of Arizona. His book contains a geographic and topical litany of our national failure to manage water effectively, a failure that political candidates will probably avoid in campaigns because it is so contentious. For Connecticut, he cites the infamous 2005 case of fish flopping in the sucked-dry Fenton River and reports that 60 Connecticut rivers suffer from “flow impairment.”
Biologically, we Homo sapiens are mostly water. Locally, nearly every town has water-resource heroes setting good examples or putting pressure on local governments to do the right thing. And technologically, we’re very ingenious when necessary. But as a nation, we’ve screwed up big time.
Politically, our watersheds do not align with government jurisdictions. Demographically, we’re uprooting from water-rich states to water-poor ones. Economically, we treat water as if it were free, which is why we use: 2,500 gallons to produce a pound of beef; 1,700 gallons to produce a gallon of ethanol; untold millions of gallons to cool electrical power plants and the hidden server farms giving us air-conditioned Internet connections; and untold billions of gallons of potable water to flush our excrement.
Legally, approximately two-thirds of U.S. states are fighting water wars with neighboring states. This summer, for example, a U.S. Appeals Court awarded Metro Atlanta unlimited use of water from Lake Lanier, a multipurpose reservoir created by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The two downstream states of Florida and Alabama will appeal because they’re feeling robbed, a situation similar to that of downstream Mexico with respect to the upstream Colorado River. These states must be especially galled by Snow Mountain in Georgia, an artificial winter wonderland located near waterhungry Atlanta, where winter high temperatures average between 50 and 65 degrees. There, private corporations use contested water to make acres of artificial snow in order to make oodles of cash.
Water is Earth’s most vital substance. As our climate changes, individuals can respond to annoyances like mosquitoes by making personal choices. But with respect to the blessing of water, most of us are hostage to government policy.