Can't pay? Won't pay -- putting a price on water

Yet, with all the concern about water, at least in the US, I see no one at all coming up with any plans to recover water that goes to waste like rainfall. No one is building desalinization plants, which seems to me to be a common sense solution, especially in California. Australia and, I think, Israel are both using desalinization as partial solutions. But Goddess forbid those California rich folks should have a big, ugly plant blocking their view of the ocean from their million dollar houses. Of course, when, at some time in the future, they're struggling to get a glass of water, they will, of course, raise hell with the government for not building those plants. Yes, it is expensive for the startup. But once in full production, the water could be provided quite affordably.

Yes, Japan does have lots of water. I haven't lived there for many years, but I fondly remember many beautiful mountain streams and rivers. Mismanagement of those resources is a wholly different question which I have no information on. But in any given situation like this, mismanagement is most often my first guess at the source of the problem. That and a complete lack of simple common sense in pretty much every government in the world.

At least this is one area in which Japan is resource rich. Plenty of water here. Not always managed very well, but more than enough if managed properly.

Agreed ArtistAtLarge. I would add we need to also maintain the cleanliness of all the worlds water. It's a great food source if clean and consumption source when needed.

Desalination plants and process is costly but some regions of the world need them today.

A severe FRESH water shortage is coming. This has been reported since the end of the last century and has been adopted as given by all of the major nations' military who foresee increased armed conflict because of it.

The real shortage is political and engineering will to build desalination plants by the thousands. The political problem is obvious, the engineering problem is being able to make it very cheap. However, someone, somewhere has solved this problem.

In the end, it appears the human race will do what it always does: wait until the last minute, causing untold pain and suffering for millions.