Pacific Institute
Co-founder and president of the Pacific Institute, a nonprofit that provides research and policy analysis on issues of development, environment, and security; 2003 MacArthur Fellow who did some of the earliest research of the impact of climate change on water resources; author of Bottled and Sold: The Story Behind Our Obsession with Bottled Water
With 6th year of drought ahead, California is slipping on conservation After enduring five of the driest years on record, California is heading into what will most likely be a sixth year of serious drought. Water scarcity is considered by many scientists – and Governor Brown – to be the new normal in California. Yet, state water officials lifted mandatory statewide cutbacks earlier this year, even though Brown added at the time that “water conservation must be a part of our everyday life.” Well, is it?
Feinstein Introduces $1.3 Billion Drought-Relief Bill Republicans in Congress have already passed a bill to ease the drought in California's Central Valley by rolling back environmental protections. Until now, the Senate hasn't been heard from. Yesterday, Democrat Dianne Feinstein proposed spending $1.3 billion for water storage, desalination and other projects. Peter Gleick is a MacArthur Fellow and member of the National Academy of Sciences. He's also president and co-founder of the nonprofit Pacific Institute in Oakland.
Water Wars Loom as World Supply Shrinks For decades, countries around the world have ignored warnings about upcoming wars over water and worked hard to build a global middle class — with growing prosperity that depends on what turns out to be a finite resource. Companies whose profits depend on water are worried that it’s running out. The chair of giant, multi-national Nestle told Pilita Clark that the shortage of water is a “much more urgent” than climate change. She’s an environmental reporter for the Financial Times, which recently published her series called, “A World Without Water.”
Fires, Drought and Our Role in the Destruction They Cause After a year with almost no rain in Southern California, almost a million people have been forced from their homes in just four days. The National Climate Data Center has reported that 43% of the country is in condition of moderate to extreme drought. Although California's wildfires and evacuations have dominated this week's news, on the other side of the country, there's a kind of slow-motion disaster that has Georgia, Alabama and Florida competing for a dwindling supply of water. It's also hotter and drier than usual in Minnesota, the North East and the Mid-Atlantic. Is it a spell of strange weather or long-term climate change? Is it caused by global warming? Will industry, agriculture and residential development have to change to ward off future disaster?
Scorched Earth Much of Southern California is on fire tonight with serious blazes in Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino Counties. But once again, the worst of it is in San Diego County , where a half million people have been ordered out of their homes. Photo courtesy of NASA via Getty Images News
Permanent Drought and Water Efficiency The dried-out forests of South Lake Tahoe are ablaze today with hundreds of homes destroyed and hundreds more in danger. Meantime, a historically Western problem is moving East. Grass that used to be underwater caused massive fires last month in Florida's Lake Okeechobee; there's drought in about one-third of the country, including 40% of Alaska and parts on Minnesota. However, not all water shortages are caused by Mother Nature. With drought increasingly a fact of life, we talk about shortages caused by the way we use water. Are water restrictions and higher prices in store?
The Global Politics of Water Two billion people already live with too little water, and water as a means of social control could be a fact of life in the next decade. Potential conflict over water is just as great in developed countries as it is in the world's poorest nations, and the US is by no means immune. Multinational corporations have joined environmentalists in calling for action before it's too late. There will be big money in recycling, desalination and other technologies. Can they overcome the demands of agriculture, and the industrial way of life? What about global warming?
Trump's 'America First' goes missing abroad In the Middle East, President Trump is changing some policies of the Obama Administration—and reversing his own campaign attacks on Islam as a religion that "hates us." We hear about his visit to Saudi Arabia and what's at stake for the rest of his foreign excursion.
White House budget proposal slashes and burns President Trump's first budget request is considered dead on arrival in Congress — a familiar development in Capitol Hill. We hear what it reveals about the priorities of the new administration. What's likely to die… and what might survive?
Trump's new look at civil rights and global warming President Trump is reportedly ready to pull the US out of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. We look at the possible consequences. On the second half of the program, we hear about cuts in Obama-Era civil rights programs called for by the Trump Administration's first budget plan.
What happens when America retreats from the world? Is President Trump taking his "America First" agenda to extremes, withdrawing the country from the international stage on trade and climate change, distancing America from its traditional allies across the Atlantic and even threatening to physically isolate the country through the building of a wall along its southern border? León Krauze guest hosts.
