Peak Water

Peak water is here.

The term “Peak Oil” is already a cliché.  But oil can and will be replaced by alternate sources.  Water, not so much.  As the linked article says:

“But like peak oil, the low-hanging fruit of our fresh water supply has been picked and what is left requires costly environmental and financial impacts to extract."

Eighteen countries — containing roughly half of the world's population — are overpumping their aquifers.  This includes China, India and the U.S.

Desalination of sea water is not an option because of the environmental impacts and prohibitive cost.

In the U.S., fifty percent of all water is used for livestock production.  It takes 2,400 gallons of water to produce one pound of meat.

Needless to say, the reduced water supply is going to drive up food prices.

And there's another red flag that wasn't mentioned in the linked article:  the increasing privatization of the world's water supply.  The “media” is stone silent about this threat (it's not happening a lot in the U.S.).  But a lot of Third World countries are dealing with scarce and/or unsanitary water supplies PLUS a global corporation controlling their access to water and charging whatever inflated price they can get.  About the only attention this issue gets is the occasional over-the-top movie (“A Dark Truth”) or TV episode.  And that kind of publicity probably does more harm than good.

The article concludes with:

“It is only through a massive, collective effort that we will turn this ship around, but we'll need all hands on deck.”