The topic of “climate change” would be incomplete if we didn’t talk about water, so I’m going to hit a few points to shed some light on the subject. The idea of “water wars” may seem beyond our reality for most of us, but we have been in the midst of water wars for many years in California. Farmers in central California fight for every drop of water they can get from what’s left over once the reservoirs in the north are emptied to fill the reservoirs in southern California. These photos are of Folsom Lake, 2011 and 2014.
It’s estimated that within three to four years, Lake Mead will not have enough water to turn the turbines that generate the electricity at Hoover Dam. And of course we pay more attention when the problem is closer to home; the photo below is of the South Fork at Lake Oroville, where you can clearly see that something is going on.
Then there are the aquifers throughout California that are drying up one by one because we deplete them many times faster than they can replenish themselves. And by no means is this a local problem—this is happening in China, Africa, and throughout the Middle East. Something that very few people know is that China has bought the water rights to the Great Lakes in the Midwestern United States. That story goes far beyond the scope of this article but you can research it for yourself and see that water wars became a global problem while we were sleeping at the wheel.
So … I’m not going to sugarcoat this situation. The truth is that it looks very serious and it may in fact be too late to do anything about it on a grand scale. But what we can do on a smaller scale is to conserve water whenever, wherever, and however we can. I know some of you think that it’s important to have greener grass than your neighbor does but the time has arrived when we must ask, “Is it important to even have grass, or would it be better to have a garden or a low water maintenance landscape?” At the very least, check and make sure your sprinklers are functioning properly and watering only the grass, not the streets.
What’s important right now is to do everything possible on every level to create lifestyles that are in touch with the reality around us, not the lifestyles that have brought us to this point … and there’s one more thing: “Don’t kill the messenger. ?”
Rahasya Poe, Lotus Guide
P.S. Did I mention that GMO crops require more water?