Notes on California

 

California’s Drought. The new normal.

Mass Water Consumption (waste) in the Western United States

The Desert city of Palm Springs has a total of 57 golf courses, each one using up to a million gallons a day. In a single day each course in Palm Springs consumes as much water in one day as an American family of four uses in four years.

The water sprinklers that keep the turf lush and the flowers blooming in an average American garden can consume 265 gallons of water per hour.

It is my intention to document water wastage in the desert-populated areas of the United States, in particular, the commercial, and residential areas of Western California, now officially declared to be in drought.

Notes

Desert Resorts. (*Death Valley, Furnace Creek, Desert Hot Springs etc. Hotels in particular.)

Golf Courses (*Palm Springs, Las Vegas, Los Angeles)

Palm Springs  has highest water use in the state.

Lawns  (Residential, Los Angeles, Palm Springs)

Swimming Pools (residential & commercial, see hotels and resorts)

Water Theme Parks (Wet and Wild *Palm Springs.  *Raging Waters San Dimas, biggest in California)

Splash Kingdom, Redlands (Egyptian theme with worlds tallest water slide)

Food Crops (necessary but some wasteful? agriculture consumes some eighty percent of California water. See food production)

Californian farmers get their water for free.

Food production (in particular Beef  (cow pasture biggest user)And amount of water to produce product. Linked to mass food consumption.)

Almonds (10%)

Man made lakes? (ie Lake Powell) reservoirs and aquaducts. Drinking water.

Lake Mead (California Water Bank) to be tapped even though it is shrinking..

Manufacturing of bottled water? 

Land management (in particular wastage).

Contamination (ie Salton Sea. Still used to irrigate food crops) Toxic waste. (The New River (Salton)

Leaks, faults in the system badly maintained etc.

*Fracking- Uses billions of gallons of water.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_in_California (list of aqueducts and water sources)

Good Points

Waste water engineering

Recycling

Changes being made to save water

*Desalination (turning saltwater into drinking by solar energy

·  We rarely think about water when we see an automobile, for example, but producing a typical US car requires more than 50 times its weight in water (39,090 gallons)! Choosing a fuel-efficient model will help—it takes 44 gallons of water to refine one gallon of crude oil and 1,700 gallons of water to produce a gallon of ethanol.

·  A kilogram (2.2 lbs) of hamburger or steak produced by a typical California beef cattle operation, for instance, uses some 20,500 liters (5,400 gal.) of water.

·  Producing one pound of bread requires 500 gallons of water.

·  Producing one serving (8 oz.) of chicken requires 330 gallons of water.

·  Growing one cotton T-shirt requires 256 gallons of water (source: The King of California, by Arax and Wartzman). Manufacture of one pair of organic cotton jeans takes 48 gallons (source: Patagonia, 2011).

·  Producing one egg requires over 100 gallons of water.

·  Producing one serving (8 fl. oz.) of milk requires 48 gallons of water.

·  Producing one serving (2 oz.) of pasta requires 36 gallons of water.

·  Producing one serving (4.6 oz.) of oranges requires 14 gallons of water.

·  Producing one serving (4.3 oz.) of tomatoes requires 8 gallons of water.

California farmers hire dowsers to find water