Water Supply: Where the Overpopulation Rubber Hits the Road
Brenda Walker
Gradually developing disasters don't grab the human psychology the way a sudden one does, but they can be just as devastating, particularly when then substance endangered is water. Washington has ignored the resource needs of the millions it has welcomed in recent decades, and now the limits to growth are becoming a crisis
It makes no sense to add millions of immigrants to America's population when we don't have enough water for the 303 million citizens and residents already here. Yet recent Congressional debates over various flavors of amnesty have tuned out the environmental consequences of rampant growth.
An epic drought in Georgia threatens the water supply for millions. Florida doesn't have nearly enough water for its expected population boom. The Great Lakes are shrinking. Upstate New York's reservoirs have dropped to record lows. And in the West, the Sierra Nevada snowpack is melting faster each year. Across America, the picture is critically clear — the nation's freshwater supplies can no longer quench its thirst.
The government projects that at least 36 states will face water shortages within five years because of a combination of rising temperatures, drought, population growth, urban sprawl, waste and excess. [Many states seen facing water shortages Boston Globe 10/26/07]
To be more precise about the "epic drought in Georgia," Atlanta and the surrounding region have less than a 90-day supply of water, and no plan of what to do.
So far, no real backup plan exists. And there are no quick fixes among suggested solutions, which include piping water in from rivers in neighboring states, building more regional reservoirs, setting up a statewide recycling system or even desalinating water from the Atlantic Ocean.
"It's amazing that things have come to this," said Ray Wiedman, owner of an Atlanta landscaper business. "Everybody knew the growth was coming. We haven't had a plan for all the people coming here?" [No Backup if Atlanta's Faucets Run Dry Google AP 10/19/07]
(Leave it to a gardener to talk common sense.)
Droughts are a normal part of nature, and Georgia's lack of rain has been severe. But the MSM tends to underplay any negative effects of population growth, particularly when it is diverse. As a result, we don't read that the state has doubled in population since 1960, from 4 million then to over 8 million counted in the 2000 Census. In other words, there has been much attention paid to the dwindling supply of water but little to increased demand from immigration-fueled population growth.
Water Shortage= Population Longage