SSS 2008-07-23

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science, I'm Steve Mirsky. Got a few minutes? Today we have a special edition featuring a brief interview with Sciam editor, Steve Ashley.

Steve Ashley, a lot of people are very concerned about oil right now, but out there, in the distance there is this looming 1 water issue. And I mean that in both senses, we have the looming August issue of Scientific American, and we also have a big water package on the web, tell us about that.

That’s right, Steve. We have been working on the coming water crisis and covering in many different ways. Basically, water, which everyone takes for granted, is becoming more and more rare, fresh water, especially, water that you can drink, potable water. And as the population grows, and people demand more water as their incomes increase. It looks like we are goanna have a dearth 2 of water, and it's gonna get worse and worse for the next couple of decades. Looks like we have to spend a lot of money to secure enough water that we can supply for all the people in the world.

Now on the face of it, it seems more a policy issue than a science issue, so how does the science informed the policy?

Well, the science is fairy well-known, but it comes down to applying it and applying it quickly. Basically the technology that's necessary is been developed over the years, but people have not been using it. And…

Are we talking about recovering or desalination 3?  What are we talking about?

We are talking about a whole raft of steps that need to be taken. Basically, our author for the article that we wrote for the magazine,Peter Rogger, suggests six steps, we'll say. What it comes down to is couple of things that you just wouldn't think of. First of all, we spend tremendous amount of water irrigating  crops. And just getting the water to the fields, you'll lose a tremendous amount. So anything you can do to save that water will have a tremendous effect because it turns out that the biggest single use of water, fresh water, is crop irrigation. Secondly 4, one of the other problems is that, it's sort of a social not to technological 5 issue as much but a social issue. Water is basically free in most countries. If you do not pay for a resources, you do not save it. A third issue is basically a sort of an odd concept, is something of an accounting 6 issue, actually it's called virtual water. That is the water content of the products that we buy, basically the water for the crops that we grow or the water was used in factories to make a product. And if instead of sending water to a dry, arid 7 place, you send them the products that contain this "virtual water" and what that does is that it means they can get along without using their own water for creating these products, so that is another issue that could help greatly. For example, the Middle East Jordan, Israel, those countries. They all take their water from the Jordan River, and by shipping 8 Jordan virtual water in terms of products. They do not have to extract so much water from the river, so that's another big issue. A fourth step that Peter Rogger suggests is to adopt what they call "low water sanitation 9". We use a tremendous amount of water just to get human wastes out of the home. Basically by collecting faeces and the urines, separating them and then recycling for farm fertilization. One can save tremendous amounts of water and help the agriculture at the same time.

And a lot of people, I mean this's a minor 10 point in the whole thing, but I think it's gonna have to be a cultural adaptation to the idea of not flushing the toilet every time you use it.

Well you know you heard if it's yellow. It's mellow 11.

I don't know. Hates celera.

We won't get into that.

 Right, but that is a practice that can cut your flushes by maybe 80%.

 Tremendous savings 12. And it just goes down the drain.

 Literally 13. Literally speaking. So what is on the website right now that is part of the overall water package that people can access just sitting right at the computer.

 Well, basically we have the article. We have the graphics 14 from the article from very interesting maps that show what, potentially, will happen with climate change as incomes increase. We have a slide show of photos, interesting photos that basically depict 15 some of the problems with the dearth of water, the water crisis and some of the solutions, some of which I've mentioned already. We have a list of... well we have a quiz, which is kind of fun, what you know about saving water and turns out I didn't know too much about saving water and I find it fairly eye-opening. So I think our readers and web people will actually find it of interest. We have a list of ways to save water and it basically comes down to paying attention. You know little things like turning off the water as you're washing the dishes in between each dish saves a tremendous amounts of water.

 When you are shaving, between the strokes you do not have to have the water run.

When you are shaving, I mean you know, and you know although it sounds a little idealistic. Every little step that made by a huge group of people will actually have an impact on the big problem.

And over the next couple of decades, this is really going to become a major worldwide issue.

First the people in the desert areas will find it happening to them. People in Las Vegas, for example, are gonna to find it's gonna get more and more difficult. They gonna have to like not water their lawns, they're gonna have water restrictions 16 on washing their cars, things with that nature. Then depending on how climate change works as the, for example, India and China grow, you know, in terms of their income, they're gonna be demanding tremendous amounts of water right now under both those places the water tables are dropping. So they are gonna have huge restrictions in for those giant population who knows how that's gonna work out. Basically, almost everyone is gonna  be faced with this at one point or another.

For Scientific American's 60-Second Science, I'm Steve Mirsky.