Thirsty world must wake up to looming water crisis, expert says

A crisis just as big as global warming.

And although in Japan rainy season is becoming shorter every year, I don't seem to hear anything about it. No doubt we will have problems in the future.

One one to combat water shortage is to greatly improve Solar energy utilization which can then lead to salt water being extracted from the oceans and made drinkable through desalinization. If we have infinite energy through the use of solar, we can easily desalinate as much of the seas and oceans as we please.

Constraining population growth is the real solution. But no one (except a small number of contrarians) wants to do that.

Aly RustomToday 02:45 pm JST

One one to combat water shortage is to greatly improve Solar energy utilization which can then lead to salt water being extracted from the oceans and made drinkable through desalinization. If we have infinite energy through the use of solar, we can easily desalinate as much of the seas and oceans as we please.

Yes to solar harvesting, but increased desalination comes with problems, the process leaves behind a highly saline soup which then has to be disposed of. Dump it in the sea and it kills the fish stocks, leave it on land and you have a vast storage problem.

JeffLeeToday 04:48 pm JST

Constraining population growth is the real solution. But no one (except a small number of contrarians) wants to do that.

True for all sorts of problems, and sadly true.

More efficient storage as well as improved resource usage and allocation will need to be the way forward. Huge dams out side of a dictatorship are not likely to be acceptable but there are many small things that though of little impact of them selves can be done on an individual level which if applied across the entire population will have a major impact. Properly managed the soil can hold a large reservoir and aleviate flooding to boot. But not if you cover everything in concrete or other hard surfaces.

As mentioned in the article, efficient direct irrigation to plants can alleviate a lot of problems but the farmers need to be incentivised or they will go on using their existing wasteful infrastructure, which is where pricing water as a scarce asset comes in to play.

And although in Japan rainy season is becoming shorter every year, I don't seem to hear anything about it. No doubt we will have problems in the future.

I don't think so. One of the reasons I think Japan has a reasonably good chance in the future is that it has lots of water, and will continue to. Sometimes too much water. But I tell people too much is better than too little, which much of the world will be facing soon. Drought kills multitudes more than flooding.

Places like Australia, China and California have incredibly wasteful water practices. They will pay a huge price for that in the near future.

It's closed system. We'll never run out of water.

Fracking uses huge amounts water to free oil and natural gas trapped deep in underground rocks.

Yes to solar harvesting, but increased desalination comes with problems, the process leaves behind a highly saline soup which then has to be disposed of. Dump it in the sea and it kills the fish stocks, leave it on land and you have a vast storage problem.

That soup can then be studied as to how it can be used. Plus remember that one of the biggest problems of global warming is the artic melting and fresh water being dumped into the ocean disturbing the ecology there. That soup may be used to regain that balance.