🚀 go-pugleaf

"Mavi G�zler" <mavigozler@yahooSTOPSPAM.com> writes:

<snip>

> Prop 50
> Water Quality, Supply and Safe Water Drinking Projects
> Coastal Wetlands Purchase and Protein Initiative Statute
> 
> Resolute YES
> 
> It's not so much that I buy into the truth of the arguments
> of the proponents, but I can smell the poor understanding in
> and ideological bent of the arguments of those opposing it.
> For one thing, opponents believe the solution is to build
> a couple of dams and to engineer yet another Peripheral
> Canal so that southern Californians can continue to
> wash their cars with unmetered water in severe drought
> years.  Those arguing against this statute proposal show
> a criminal ignorance of ecological principles that not
> even small children fail to perceive.
> 
> Fug 'em.

Alas, the above analysis simply shows how slick and efficient the
marketeers have become.  Even clearly intelligent voters can be
bamboozled and flumoxed with high-sounding arguments about otherwise
boondoggle propositions.

I'm a water resources engineer. I've voted against everyone of the
water bonds in recent years and I'll almost certainly vote against
this one.

Why?  Two reasons.  First, I have a general principle of voting
against bond measures that don't have an economic return.  A bond is a
loan, and I believe that a loan of any significance should show a
return on investment.  The water bonds in recent years (this is the
3rd, I think) have instead supported an enormous number of studies and
some environmental improvements, in spite of their misleading names
about "drinking water quality", etc., which projects are only a tiny
fraction of the overall bond.

The studies keep me employed and I'm not opposed to environmental
improvements, but these should be paid for in other ways, not taking
out multi-billion-dollar loans.  A corollary to my first reason is
that the water bond descriptions have been very deceptively written.
I'm not going to support dishonest propositions.

Second, California's water problems have two relatively
straight-forward solutions, one political, one technical, which no one
will talk about.  California has a shortage of water in areas that
need it, and to some extent the quality of the raw source water is
inadequate also.  We also legitimately need more water for
environmental purposes.  California has been using over its share of
Colorado River water and must cut that back. What to do?

California's main water movers, the State Water Project and the
federal Central Valley Project, both ship water down the Sacramento
River from the north, through the Delta, and then pump at the southern
end of the Delta to the San Joaquin Valley and urban Southern
California. The Delta is a huge bottleneck.  Moving that much water
through it creates environmental havoc and degrades relatively good
Sacramento water with salts from the ocean and ag runoff.  

The answer is, yes, the dreaded Peripheral Canal.  But not the massive
30,000 cfs monster of 1980, rather, a much reduced (say 10-12,000 cfs)
canal to handle current pumping and no more.

So here's the political fix.  Build the PC, move the water around the
Delta directly into the pumps, and let the Delta revert back to its
original state: a huge, lush, brackish water wetlands.  Can you
imagine the environmental benefits?  It would be the most significant
project this side of the Mississippi.  Everybody wins:
environmentalists get an enormous new wetlands, SoCal gets cleaner and
more reliable water.

Ooops, just one problem.  The landowners in the Delta don't like this
because it puts them out of business. This tiny handful of farmers
(1000??) is holding hostage 30 million Californians because they want
to continue to grow crops like corn in the Delta.  Don't we have
entire states devoted to that?

The other fix is technical and economic: desalinization.  Significant
advances in desal technology have reduced the cost of this to
something like $1000 and acre-ft or lower.  Your stereotypical family
is supposed to use 1/2 to 1 acre-ft per year.  Assuming their willing
to pay $50-$100 per month for water to their new half-million dollar
home, that means they can now be supplied with desal water, or
reclaimed water, or other non-traditional supplies.

Instead, the water buffalos want more dams, more reservoirs, and so
on.  They're not needed.  What is needed is for someone to point out
that the water emperor, if not buck-naked, is running around in his
skivvies.