Friday, August 03, 2007

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words
















Manila, Philippines: Rows of shanties contribute to the pollution of an inland river. A recent report released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the global development network of the United Nations, noted that more than 10 million Filipinos have no access to safe drinking water, while more than 21 million lack basic sanitation.

Photograph: Mike F Alquinto/EPA
























Guangxi province, China: Girls play on parched land. Last year a severe drought left more than 2.4 million people short of drinking water.

Photograph: AP























Hyderabad, India: Women struggle through a crowd to reach a mobile water tanker in a slum area.Photograph: Mahesh Kumar/AP























Lake Nakuru National Park, Kenya: One of thousands of dead flamingos on the dry lake bed. The number of flamingoes living on the lake had declined dramatically, a number of factors have been blamed including the receding waters of the lake, and pollution.

Photograph: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP


More here

Pray for our Earth...And then please go out and make a difference.

Thursday, August 02, 2007

In Praise of Tap Water

In Praise of Tap Water

Editorial
Published: August 1, 2007

On the streets of New York or Denver or San Mateo this summer, it seems the telltale cap of a water bottle is sticking out of every other satchel. Americans are increasingly thirsty for what is billed as the healthiest, and often most expensive, water on the grocery shelf. But this country has some of the best public water supplies in the world. Instead of consuming four billion gallons of water a year in individual-sized bottles, we need to start thinking about what all those bottles are doing to the planet’s health.

Here are the hard, dry facts: Yes, drinking water is a good thing, far better than buying soft drinks, or liquid candy, as nutritionists like to call it. And almost all municipal water in America is so good that nobody needs to import a single bottle from Italy or France or the Fiji Islands. Meanwhile, if you choose to get your recommended eight glasses a day from bottled water, you could spend up to $1,400 annually. The same amount of tap water would cost about 49 cents.

Next, there’s the environment. Water bottles, like other containers, are made from natural gas and petroleum. The Earth Policy Institute in Washington has estimated that it takes about 1.5 million barrels of oil to make the water bottles Americans use each year. That could fuel 100,000 cars a year instead. And, only about 23 percent of those bottles are recycled, in part because water bottles are often not included in local redemption plans that accept beer and soda cans. Add in the substantial amount of fuel used in transporting water, which is extremely heavy, and the impact on the environment is anything but refreshing.

Tap water may now be the equal of bottled water, but that could change. The more the wealthy opt out of drinking tap water, the less political support there will be for investing in maintaining America’s public water supply. That would be a serious loss. Access to cheap, clean water is basic to the nation’s health.

Some local governments have begun to fight back. Earlier this summer, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom prohibited his city’s departments and agencies from buying bottled water, noting that San Francisco water is “some of the most pristine on the planet.” Salt Lake City has issued a similar decree, and New York City recently began an advertising campaign that touted its water as “clean,” “zero sugar” and even “stain free.”

The real change, though, will come when millions of ordinary consumers realize that they can save money, and save the planet, by turning in their water bottles and turning on the tap.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Do you know what people in Africa and other parts of this world who do not have the luxury of turning on a tap and getting water would do if they had the chance to enjoy water as we do for even one day? How they would praise it, appreciate it, and look upon our wasteful consumption and greed as going against the spirits that provide that water for our spiritual and physical sustinence?

So yes, praise your tap water and thank whatever spirit you believe brings us miracles, because we are truly blessed among people to have it. Praise the fact that you do not need to walk six hours a day over rocky and dangerous terrain just to haul back a few jugs of water that well may be contaminated for your family's use that only lasts enough for them to drink and cook for one day, until you have to go out and do it again the next day, and the next, and the next... All the while fearing that you will not make it home with your water without it being stolen from you with worse happening to you. Praise that your daughters can attend school and get an education and not have to be slaves to traditions that make them haul water every day instead of learning. Praise that you don't have to live a day without the water that bathes your body and soothes your soul.

The saying goes that we do not appreciate water until the well runs dry. I then believe that people in this country will also not appreciate what they have until they are made to see the scam that the bottled water industry is and how it takes advantage of us for profit blinding us to the blessings we have. So praise your tap water, do away with the mass marketing deceptions that are causing you to be part of the problem rather than the solution, and see the light.

My next entry will be on how the climate crisis is exacerbating the water crisis in the Sudan, and also an introduction to the Amman Imman Project.


At what price our planet?

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Lack Of Public Water Plagues Rural Tennessee


Tammy Blatt washes dishes outside near the drums of water that she and her husband, Wayne, must buy and haul twice a week, at considerable expense, since their well went dry in April. The Blatts live on a farm near Carthage in Smith County. (SHELLEY MAYS / THE TENNESSEAN)



Jason Thompson of Sumner County holds a glass of water taken from his spring. The water, which contains high levels of iron and bacteria, is not drinkable, and they have to haul water. (SHELLEY MAYS / THE TENNESSEAN)




Tina Pearson wipes tears from her face after talking about how her children might have drunk contaminated water from her well. (SHELLEY MAYS/THE TENNESSEAN)



Eva Shachno discusses the retaining pond her family uses to hold water from a creek. Her husband built a pump system to carry water to their trailer for bathing and washing clothes. (SHELLEY MAYS/THE TENNESSEAN)

Lack Of Public Water Plagues Rural Tennessee
Sunday, 07/15/07

Lack of public water plagues rural Tennessee
Cost to connect all is $1.7B; some use risky sources

By SHEILA WISSNER
Staff Writer

Eva Shachno inspects the half-submerged pump humming quietly in a creek near her home in northern Sumner County.

A long, green garden hose snakes from the pump to a hand-built retaining pond and then into her trailer, where she uses the untreated water for bathing and washing clothes. She fills up gallon jugs at the dog kennel where she works to use for drinking, cooking and brushing her teeth.

The Shachno household is among an estimated 112,000 across rural Tennessee that don't have public water.

But extending water lines to every rural home in Tennessee would cost an estimated $1.7 billion, and local officials say money is in short supply. The state has no organized plan to extend the lines or to aid those who, like the Shachnos, have no water. Some legislators say that needs to change.

"The irony to me is, we are talking about an hour's drive from downtown Nashville, in the eighth-largest county in the state, in 2007,'' said state Rep. Mike McDonald, a Democrat who represents northern Sumner County.

In many cases, the well or spring water they use is perfectly fine. But in others, it is contaminated with bacteria, foul-smelling sulfur or other pollutants, putting the occupants at risk of illness. Some have no water at all, resorting to systems like the Shachnos have devised.

Residents in Sumner, Marshall, Clay, Warren, Overton and other counties have asked for help. In the case of the Shachnos, a Portland city water line ends just a few hundred yards away — they've been waiting six years for it to be extended to their home. In the interim, Eva's husband, Mike, devised the pump-and-hose system.

"I just think it's ridiculous, living in this day and time, paying taxes like everybody else, we cannot have water," Eva said as she gave two county commissioners a tour of her jury-rigged water system last week. "It's just not fair."

The Shachnos could get city water this year. Their road is on a list for a water line — if grant money comes through. County Executive Hank Thompson said he's optimistic.

Many others will still be waiting.


snip

Water is dirty, smelly

Wayne and Tammy Blatt rolled snake eyes after moving to a farm near Carthage in Smith County a year and a half ago. After spending $3,000 to sink a well some 220 feet into the ground, it went dry in April.

They have been hauling water ever since. And it gets costly.

Every three days or so, they run their pickup truck into town with a half-dozen 55-gallon drums in the back. They fill up at the utility district in Carthage, paying $8 each time. They just paid $600 for a 1,500-gallon drum they will use to feed their house and $300 for a 250-gallon drum they can haul behind the pickup on a trailer to get even more water in each haul.

"It's been a real pain trying to get water," Wayne Blatt said.

Those lucky enough to hit water often find it smells like rotten eggs from the high sulfur content, making it impossible to drink.

"It makes your skin crawl,'' said Wendy Greer of the sulfur well water she bathes in at her home in Marshall County. Her 90-year-old father's well is even worse, she said.

Likewise, water from the well at Brenda Mandrell's Sumner County home drizzles into her sinks in smelly, yellow streams if she doesn't pour bleach down the well every other day. She's afraid to drink the bacteria-contaminated water or use it for cooking, so she buys bottled water instead.

"I have a $4,000 water treatment system in there that I had to cut off because it wasn't doing any good,'' Mandrell said.

The lack of rain is making it worse, she said, a point echoed by Thompson, the county executive, who said the underground water level has dropped as more people have moved to the area and as rains have refused to fall.

Those without good water say they fear for their health and that of their families. But neither the state Department of Health nor Environment and Conservation conducts routine tests of private water sources to ensure their safety, officials in those departments said.

end of excerpt.

No, this isn't a remote village in Africa or South America, this is Tennessee, in the United States of America. I am posting this because it appears that so many people really don't seem to care about water issues because they believe it doesn't affect them. They think it is only something relegated to stories of tribal families in far away places. Well, it isn't. Many Americans who live in rural areas right here in America have little or no access to water as politics, economics, and environment stand in their way. And to me it is a travesty. The cost to connect these people is what we approximately spend in Iraq in a week's time. Where is Tennessee's money going if not to then benefit its citizens?

When I read stories about Kenya, Niger, Peru, and other areas of the world where the poor have little or no access to potable water which causes famine, disease, and death, it shakes my soul because I believe NO ONE in this world should have to go without potable water. No child should have to deal with the fear of wondering if the water they are drinking is killing them instead of nourshing them. And that is true regardless of where they live in this world.

Therefore, if after reading this you are as incensed as I am regarding this total lack of caring on the part of the state of Tennessee in providng potable water to all of their residents, you can contact the state government in Tennessee to voice your opinion on this and urge them to do what is morally right for their people:

GIVE THEM WATER.


Governor's Office
Tennessee State Capitol
Nashville, TN 37243-0001

Phone: 615.741.2001
Fax: 615.532.9711
Email: phil.bredesen@state.tn.us

Monday, July 30, 2007

African Mapping Highlights Risk Of Drought and Flood

African Mapping Highlights Drought and Flood

African mapping highlights risk of drought and flood
The map will help predict droughts Nell Barrie
27 July 2007
Source: SciDev.Net

The European Space Agency (ESA) has produced maps of soil moisture levels in southern Africa, and says they will help predict floods and droughts.

The maps of countries in the Southern African Development Community were published online last week (16 July) and will be available to governmental and independent organisations free of charge.

Conventional methods of measuring soil moisture are expensive and inaccurate as each measurement has to be done on-site. ESA's ENVISAT satellite measures soil moisture levels by emitting radar waves and measuring the energy bounced back by the soil.

High levels of soil moisture can lead to flooding and erosion, and low levels cause crops to wilt and die.

Annett Bartsch, project coordinator at Vienna University of Technology, Austria, explained how the maps are used. "Areas of saturated upper soil can be identified with ENVISAT," she said. These areas are those at risk of flooding.

The maps can also help predict droughts by looking at past trends in soil moisture. "Provided that a long enough reference database is available, anomalies can be identified and thus… drought risk areas identified," she told SciDev.Net.

In a changing climate, predicting when and where floods are likely to happen is becoming more and more important, according to Geoff Pegram, co-researcher on the project at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. "Although we cannot prevent floods, we can anticipate them and hopefully get people out of the way."

"I think it is really a breakthrough," said Wolfgang Wagner, professor of remote sensing at the Vienna University of Technology in Austria. He said that the satellite is the first to provide enough measurements over the right timescale to give detailed maps of soil moisture.

The maps have been produced as part of the SHARE project (Soil Moisture for Hydrometeorological Applications in the Southern African Development Community).

The SHARE project is part of ESA's TIGER initiative, which aims to assist African countries in managing water-related problems by using satellite data. The next stage of the initiative involves transferring leadership of the projects to African authorities.


Earthimages/ESA











Africa, July 30, 2007

Climate Change Center Foresees Longer Dryer Droughts
Excerpt:

So what can we expect to see in the next 100 years? Unfortunately, we can expect to see many of the above trends continue or accelerate unless technological and social initiatives are carried out to curb emissions, provide more sustainable land and resource use, and increase economic security throughout the regions of the world. The IPCC used a variety of scenarios to project future impacts and trends. The scenarios differ in the assumed rate of population growth and expansion, rate of implementation of cleaner and more efficient energy, and levels of economic development. The scenarios also factor whether the loci of control for the implementation of the social, economic and environmental policies are global, regional, or local.

For example, a scenario with a peak in global population at mid-century and then an ensuing decline, with a global introduction of “clean and resource efficient technologies,” reduced material consumption and a focus on global solutions, resulted in a “best estimate” projected surface temperature change of 1.8 degrees by the last decade of this century. An alternative scenario that maintained the intensity of use of fossil fuels, with mid-century achievement of maximum global population and ensuing decline, rapid economic growth and increased social and cultural interaction and capacity building could result in a “best estimate” increase of 4.0 degrees by 2090.

Regardless of the specific scenario, IPCC projects that many of the observed trends are likely to continue. Specific projections related to drought include:

Decreased precipitation in tropical and subtropical land regions.

Increased hot nights, hot days and heat waves.

Increased evapotranspiration as a result of increased temperature and decreased precipitation.

Significant decrease in precipitation in the Sahel, Mediterranean, Southern Africa and Southern Asia.

Decline in mountain glaciers, snowpack and snow cover, particularly in the Northern Hemisphere.

Continued decrease in the total area of seasonally frozen ground.

A pole-ward movement of extratropical storm tracks resulting in continued changes in wind, temperature and precipitation patterns.

The IPCC’s projections demonstrate the need for actions to be taken on all levels to offset and mitigate the impacts of climate change. The panel projected more widespread and intense droughts in regions where the world is currently seeing high levels of population growth, economic development and social conflict, which will jeopardize food security, access to safe drinking water and economic stability for a high percentage of the world’s population.

End of excerpt.


Climate change is occurring in Africa as droughts are more sustained and severe than previously. This then means sustained famine and wars (as is ocurring in Darfur) as well as water shortages will continue to be part of life in this land particularly in Southern Africa, if people are not given the tools and education necessary to understand what is taking place and how to deal with it.

And not only will drought continue to change the landscape and way of life of millions of people, but changes in precipitation patterns brought about by erratic changes in sea surface temperature and melting glaciers will bring rains to those areas not accustomed to it, and a lack of precipitation in the very areas that need it most...the areas that depend on precipitation to grow food.

Water scarcity is not just the problem of lack of potable water. It is also a crisis that affects all we do from bathing, drinking, medical care, spiritual sustinence, and most importantly growing the food that sustains our bodies and minds.

Therefore, the satellite and radar technology now being enployed that can predict such disasters as floods and droughts while not being able to stop climate change and other factors leading to scarcity, drought, and its effects is an invaluable tool in working to save lives and perhaps in time be able to predict such occurrences further in advance in order to effect changes in agricultural areas that will best suit the needs of its people based on changing environmental conditions.

Nothing however, can replace the true good that can come from people having the knowledge mecessary to make informed and moral decisions regarding their use of water, and even though Africa is a continent being affected the most by this crisis, I still hold out hope in the humanity and goodwill of others that we can work together to solve this crisis in time. This radar technology is just one example.

Here is something else I support wholeheartedly:

Solar for Africa Waterpumps

Africa was made for solar power, and it is clean, safe, easy to install, and does not put out the amount of GHGS that other methods including nuclear do.

There are ways to solve this crisis. Together we can do it.

Main site:

Solar For Africa

Another World Water Day Gone

We see another World Water Day pass us by. The theme, Water For All, signifies that though some progress has been made we are woefully behin...