[env-trinity] Cotton versus salmon

[Ara Azhderian]

And most of those 38 million people, and tens of millions more, rely on
the milk, butter, cheese, meat, and other products those forage crops
sustain.

 

Be well,

 

Ara Azhderian

 

________________________________

From: env-trinity-bounces at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us
[mailto:env-trinity-bounces at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us] On Behalf Of
Spreck Rosekrans
Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2008 5:35 PM
To: Tom Stokely; Trinity List
Subject: Re: [env-trinity] Cotton versus salmon

 

Cotton has been in steep decline in CA for the last few years due to
foreign competition, but more water goes to alfalfa and pasture alone
than to our cities with 38 million people.

Spreck Rosekrans

 -----Original Message-----
From:   Tom Stokely [mailto:tstokely at trinityalps.net]
Sent:   Tuesday, June 10, 2008 08:02 PM Eastern Standard Time
To:     Trinity List
Subject:        [env-trinity] Cotton versus salmon

http://www.times-standard.com/ci_9527353?IADID=Search-www.times-standard
.com-www.times-standard.com
Cotton versus salmon
Aldaron Laird/My Word/The Times-Standard
Article Launched: 06/09/2008 01:34:16 AM PDT



The governor has declared that California is in a drought. Generally,
there are two solutions: Build more dams to store water (one of the
governor's proposals) or reduce our use of water. But it takes a long
time to build new dams, so that plan will do nothing to help us during
this drought. We need to prioritize water use.

Of all the usable water behind dams, urban water users consume 20
percent and agricultural users 80 percent. The governor would like to
see a 20 percent reduction in urban water use; this would yield only a 4
percent savings in the amount of water now being consumed.

Much more water can be saved by achieving a similar 20 percent reduction
in agriculture water use. That saving would be 16 percent!

California needs its agriculture, but farmers need to become much more
efficient water users. California can no longer afford the water demands
of the status quo. Our climate is changing, and how we use water must
change, too.

It is now popular to consider the carbon footprint generated by the
energy demands of our way of life and the goods we consume. We need to
do the same for water by accounting for how much water is used when we
live wherever we choose, and when we grow whatever and wherever we
choose.

The water we Californians consume also requires lots of energy to pump,
filter, clean and deliver. Depending on where and how we secure that
energy, water use has a significant carbon footprint. For example, it
takes much more water and energy to keep a 100-square-foot lawn green in
Anaheim than it does in Arcata.

Where you grow plants matters. Hotter and drier areas evaporate more
water from the soil, the irrigation system and the plant. Cotton, one
our state's major crops, needs a lot of water to grow, yet one of the
largest cotton-growing areas in California is located in the hot, dry,
southern portion of the Central Valley, an area called Westlands.

The water imported to raise cotton in Westlands comes from the Trinity
River, which is a major tributary of the Klamath River. If water used to
raise cotton was instead allowed to remain in the Trinity, the recovery
chances of the threatened salmon fisheries of the Klamath would be much
improved.

In this age of climate change, we have our priorities wrong. Perhaps the
water in the Trinity should be used to recover and raise a bountiful
crop of salmon on the North Coast, not cotton in the Westlands desert.

Raising cotton in a hot dry environment can waste as much as 41 percent
of the irrigation water due to evaporation (www.waterfootprint.org). How
many salmon could have been raised with that water?

Reassessing our water use priorities will be difficult, but the status
quo cannot be maintained and with our climate changing right now, we
have no choice. We have no time or water to waste, and California needs
leaders with the vision to face the water crisis of the 21st century.


Aldaron Laird is on the board of directors for the Humboldt Bay
Municipal Water District. He lives in Arcata.



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