Blah, Blah, Blah. Powerful words coming from a teen who doesn’t want to wait until she’s in her sixties before greenhouse gas emissions are under control. Greta Thunberg from Sweden is understandably impatient. I am too. I have a shorter timeline and would like to see change before I die and that is only a few years away. It would be calming as I exit to know my grandchildren will be okay.
I’ve been doing research for my latest novel, an action story centered on water. It’s inspired by a concern for food shortages and the lack of clean drinking water that’s causing millions of people to migrate. No country wants hoards of starving people at their borders. Wondering how it could be stopped, what I’ve read is horrifying. In addition to war, tens of thousands of people around the world are dying every day from water-related illnesses.
Much of the problem is caused by the global commodification of water by corporations and governments. Throughout history, cultures knew that water could run out and respected it. Communities operated on the premise that people had a right to clean water and established guardian systems to protect and use it in a fair manner. In the United States, municipal districts managed water and sewage systems for the benefit of all.
This communal mindset began to change in the West with the pioneers. Cowboy economics was set up as a system based on prior appropriation that gave water rights to the first claim owner. That homesteader was free to use or sell as much water from his land or the aquifers underneath as he wanted. In the mid-1900s the concept of owning water rights went global with a push to privatize sources. Today, the question of whether water is a human right or a commodity leans in the direction of corporate America. Defined as a commodity, water made its way to the New York Stock exchange.
The World Trade Organization sees it as a hindrance to trade since water is needed to produce goods. This type of thinking led to a boom in privatization and water was diverted from small farms to corporate farming and manufacturing.
What we can’t see, we usually don’t pay attention to. Groundwater stored under the earth’s surface accounts for 60 percent of all freshwater. For it to stay a viable source, aquifers have to be refilled at the same rate they are emptied. With funds made available to build deep wells, water is removed with electric pumps and sent through pipes to industry and agri-farms. When aquifers are drained it leaves small farmers without a livelihood and ordinary people without clean drinking water.
Municipalities short on cash are adding to the problem. They are selling their water at the appraised value of total replacement costs rather than commonly accepted book value which is lower in order to get more money for loans and higher prices for its sale. High prices are covered by increased rates to consumers, the ultimate ratepayers. Shortsighted, they are draining a resource their communities may need in the future.
Moving water is expensive. It is heavier than oil and evaporates on the way. It is often sent to agricultural areas raising crops that don’t belong in that environment. Rice fields that have to be flooded in dry California don’t make sense. Moving it creates serious ecological and human rights ramifications for both sellers and buyers.
Bottling companies with water rights ae charging consumers 2000 times more for a gallon of water than if purchased it by turning on the tap. In third-world countries, with surface and groundwater polluted by industrial and agricultural waste, many families have no choice but to spend 30 percent of their income on clean water.
What can you do? Make sure your community’s water and sewer system stays public and does not become privatized. Private companies are in it to make money. If they do sub-contract there need to be strict guidelines and strong oversight. Sub-contracting for services is rarely cost-effective and almost always leads to a hike in rates.
Rivers traveling through multiple states need better regulation. The Colorado River is a prime example of misuse. It was never meant to flood desert farms and water-guzzling plants. Rising temperatures created a mega-drought that has been ongoing for the past 20 years. The river can’t be expected to provide fresh water to out of control population growth. Forty million people and wildlife depend on the Colorado River for their water and it is going dry. Arizona is the state most affected. States like Oregon have migrants arriving from the Southwest in record numbers.
Commercial transfers of bulk water should not be allowed. They destroy local plant life, agriculture, fish populations, and it is expensive. They drain aquifers and streams for the sake of other communities. True Alaska Bottling holds the right to export 9.5 billion gallons annually at a penny a gallon from Blue Lake reservoir. They want to ship it from Sitka to India, the Middle East, parts of China. and California. At the moment their plans are on hold but it may happen soon. Instead of acting in our country’s national interest, powerful cartels have formed that create hell in third-world countries. Their people come knocking at our door for handouts and we wonder why.
Don’t drink bottled water. Get a home filter if you are not confident in city purification. Why make companies rich on something you can have at a lower cost? Plastic bottles pollute. The purifying water causes 3 percent of greenhouse emissions because of methane and nitrous oxide used in the process.
Focus on eliminating pollution. In the old cowboy movies, when a cowhand was thirsty, he’d stop at the river, dunk his hat in and take a drink. No longer is that possible. Our rivers and streams are polluted by animal waste, industrial waste, and careless people discarding garbage and trash. We can’t continue to allow homeless people to trash their sites. I don’t like tents, but if there is no other solution, \there is no reason not to make inhabitants clean up after themselves.
In Ringwood, New Jersey, Ford Motor Co. dumped more than 35,000 tons of toxic paint sludge onto lands occupied by the Ramapough Lenape Tribe, poisoning groundwater with arsenic, lead, and other chemicals. In North Caroline residents near coal-fired power plants were told their water contained elevated levels of chromium-6. Coca-Cola and Pepsi are mentioned as being among the top 20 most pollution- producing companies in the world. Plastic bottles wind up in oceans, rivers, and streams. Oil leaks from cars and trucks, and runoff from farms and ranches send herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers into rivers and oceans via rainwater.
Yes, Blah, Blah, Blah. Stop talking—take action, says a young activist. You know what to do. Do it now.
References:
Website, (2021) Water Commodification and Privatization of Municipal Water Services. Sierra Club. retrieved from https://www.sierraclub.org/policy/water-commodification-and-corporate-privatization-municipal-water-sewer-services
Podcast. (2021) What Happens When the Colorado River Runs Dry. Science Friday PBS. retrieved from https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/colorado-river-dry/
Barlow,B. & Clarke, T. (2020) Blue Gold. the New Press,NY. ISBN 978-1-56584-731-6.
Also available as a Netflix documentary.
Sguvam v, (2000) Water Wars. Privatization, Pollution, and Profit. Souther Press, Cambridge, MA. library of congress number 2002100340.
Newsstaff ( 2017) Industrial Waste Pollutes Americas Drinking Water. Carter Center for Public Integrity. retrieved from https://publicintegrity.org/environment/industrial-waste-pollutes-americas-drinking-water/
Young, A. (2019) Coca-Cola, Pepsi highlight the 20 corporations producing the most ocean pollution. USA Oday. retrieved from https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/06/17/20-corporations-behind-the-most-ocean-pollution/39552009/
Douglass, E. (2017) Towns sell their water systems-and come to regret it. Washington Post. retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/towns-sell-their-public-water-systems–and-come-to-regret-it/2017/07/07/6ec5b8d6-4bc6-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html
Walton,B 92010) Bulk water Exports: Alaska CityWants to sell the World a Drink. Circle of blue. retrieved from https://www.circleofblue.org/2010/world/bulk-water-exports-alaska-city-wants-to-sell-the-world-a-drink/
Art is always for sale. The Firmament is 16″ x 21? gold frame/ acrylic on canvas. Available for $695
