I’m East for a week to give a lecture at Dartmouth on water quality, and to visit my parents in Vermont. I’ll be away from a computer, so I tried to do a week’s worth of essays in advance for Bob to post day by day (I ended up padding the pile with a few water pieces, but so be it).
This is the total water use in the US, from 1950 to 2000. You might notice that total water use today is about the same as it was in 1970, though our population increased by 80 million since then (from 203 million in 1970 to 280 million in 2000). Did you notice that immense conservation effort? Did it cramp your lifestyle? As far as I can tell, this reduction in consumption was nearly unnoticable.
Water is considered to be a public good in the US, while energy is private business. More energy used meant more (private) profits, so we live in a country where air conditioners can be energy hogs, but everyone installs 1.6 gallon flush toilets.
With a pause for recession, our total energy consumption grew substantially since 1970, while total water consumption stayed constant (and per capita consumption is down by 1/3).
Energy use was left to market forces, while water use was curbed by laws requiring low flow fixtures. Hmmm.
looking forward to the education and have a great visit in the northeast! Bob is a trooper!