given his stance on climate change.

Even though it was their worldview that got us into this exacerbated drought mess in the first place!

n/t

When water is worth more than the oil they can get out of fracking, it will only make sense. But California needs to do it now. I hope he does do something. And bottled water should be gone or taxed to death.

industrial sized backlash.

the state that are used to mine our precious water and of course ban fracking if it uses California water or in any way diminishes the clean water supply in California.

No company or person should profit from our water shortage. Commercially sold and bottled water should be brought in from out of our state. The water in California should belong to the people of California. If we don't restrict water rights in that way, the poor will die of thirst and the rich will pay dearly for water. Water is like air -- a necessity. We can't allow companies to pollute our air and then sell us purified air. Same for water.

In my community, the old geezers on the architectural review committee think of artificial turf as low-brow and insist on real lawns.

...and water diversion, with many streams being pumped nearly dry to serve back country grows. While I support cannabis growers generally, water diversion is a real problem up here. Part of the problem can be solved by legalization-- those grows way up the canyon are likely there now because of prohibition, but that isn't going to help the rural land owners who depend upon cannabis today. It will require that cultivation be moved to places with sufficient water to plant, i.e. it will make cannabis compete with existing agriculture for access to increasingly fewer acre-feet of stored water.

That will likely be a real bummer for my county's economy, which is currently based almost exclusively on cannabis production, most of it in rural grows dependent upon small streams and rivers.

Us poor people with nothing but some dead plants are not the problem.

My mom has a huge, plush green lawn (to the back, front and side of her house) with all kinds of flowers and other plants out in the middle of what used to be desert (when I was growing up there, it was still desert)...and a huge swimming pool... with a big hot tub off of it...and a fountain tumbling over a rock formation that you're supposed to jump off into the pool... in a 3700 square foot house where she is the only occupant. Her whole neighborhood is like that (except the only one occupant part).

In California, 83 percent of the water is used by agriculture -- much of it for crops and livestock that could be grown and raised elsewhere.

http://www.publiclandsranching.org/htmlres/wr_guzzling_water.htm

Another big culprit, at least in Southern California are tamarisk trees. The railroads planted hundreds of thousand, if not millions, of tamarisk trees as windbreaks. They are water hogs.

A mature tamarisk can use up to 200 gallons of water a day. By comparison, our home water usage for last month was 5,200 gallons. Estimates are that the water used by the tamarisks alone in a year could provide water for 20,000,000 people.

My not hosing down my driveway is really not going to do anything when compared to this.

As human-exacerbated drought continues, agricultural practices, landscaping with "exotics," all of it, will eventually have to change.

I think today's announcement was simply the beginning of a shift in "water culture" here in California (even if many are hoping, "well, it will surely not get any harder than this!&quot

that the tamarisks were planted by the railroads, a mode of transportation which we moved away from to one which has in large part caused the conditions which now should occasion their removal, while we will eventually be using rail transport more (or should), which would necessitate a replacement for the tamarisks.

I used to shower daily but now once a month or so which has cured my itching skin spots, athletes foot and yes even BO.

Your co-workers may disagree. You may not smell it, but they do.

My co-worker girlfriend at work would say something. I am fit, clean and I keep my clothes very clean. I definitely have less underarm BO problems so no BO spray needed anymore, and I use baby wipes on the nether region every few days.

How about changing from 3 showers a day to 2 showers a day. That is very typical for those who work out. Morning, after work out and before bed. You have to shower after working out you have no choice.

To get the sweat off. You do NOT want to use hot water and soap to strip off the natural oils or upset the microflora balance.

Is it supposed to be OK to use that much water because a person works out?

I say bullshit. If you work out, do it after work and then take one shower to cover the work day and the work out.

Taking more than one shower a day is an obscene waste of water.

The big issue, however, is agriculture and this order does not really address that other than to make more plans. I hope something can be worked out.

Are they going to make everyone cut 25% usage?

Doesn't seem fair to the ones that are already hardly using any while others haven't been at all.

I have family and friends that already let their lawns die, etc.

I don't think charging more is the answer because then all the richies down south would laugh and just keep wasting.

It can be pretty readily determined how many there are in each household and what a reasonable rate of use is. Just because my husband and I live in the house we raised our kids in doesn't mean that we 2 should continue consuming water for a family of 4.

Green lawns become a matter of social conscience -- one's neighbors will have something to say about each other's yards, and the rich will not be exempt for long, I can assure you. During the last big drought we had a bajillionaire from the Middle East locally who thought he could dig his own well on his estate in order to escape what the rest of us had to live with. He was not allowed to do that, since the aquifer involved belongs to all of us.

Some of this is not rocket science, or even very difficult. Public municipal records can be cross-referenced.

"WATER...........these people will give us WATER......."

Put $$ in to the research and development of a way to turn salt walter in to fresh water. I know it sounds all science fictiony, but I am willing to bet we can come up with SOME way to make this happen.



/ O, wait, never mind, the ancient greeks already figured out how to do it.

Solar distillation is fine but the acreage needed is obscene.

We need to limit growth and we need to meter all water use and incentivize conservation...

No desalination, though, because the moment there's a break in the drought, developers will use it as a rationale to build more shit.

You power the desalination plants by firing up a bunch of high sulfur coal burning plants to produce the needed energy. The smog from burning all that coal then blocks out the sun's light, resulting in reducing global warming AND a reduction in agricultural output, there by requiring less water. Truly a win/win/win situation!!!


What could possibly go wrong???

Brilliant!!

I also notice... the crow population seems to be massively reduced.

where they've driven off the native scrub jays.

My town has been encouraging drought-tolerant landscaping for some time (manicured gravel with a few well-placed native or similar shrubs is popular) so that expanses of green lawn really stand out. But that's a drop in an empty reservoir compared to the alfalfa, cotton, pistachio and almond growers in the Central Valley, who have already been blaming the drought on Ms Pelosi.

Why would some one hose off their drive ways?

/ just curious

Less work. Lazy~

...in this moment.

I wish we did not have that incredibly stupid term limits law.

We are in the midst of the worst drought in 1,200 years, and global climate change is heavily implicated. Governor Brown did not mince words -- our lives are going to change, period.

Much more needs to be done as suggested above -- Nestle and fracking.