WaterWired

HCN: The Year in Water - Mountain Snowpack

Great graphic in Cally Carswell's story in the High Country News. Click on the graphic to expand it.

 

"Advice is like snow -- the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind." -- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Oregon Water Conference 2011: Abstracts

The Oregon Water Conference 2011 (TOWC 2011) got off to an auspicious start yesterday; it wraps up today.

 Here is my presentation on Climate Change and Oregon's Water Future:

Download Campana_CCSession_TOWC2011

Oral presentation program and list of posters:

Download TOWC_2011_Program

Download Poster Session List TOWC 2011

Abstracts:

Download Poster Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Combined Panel Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Groundwater Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Stream Restoration Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Climate Change Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Hydrologic Monitoring Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Water Quality Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Water Management Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

Download Hydrologic Modeling Session Abstracts TOWC 2011

We will try to get the oral presentations posted as PDFs.

Good stuff! Enjoy!

 "Let us consider an alternative style of thinking, which we can call 'creative thinking.' It is playfully instructive to note that the word 'reactive' and the word 'creative' are made up of exactly the same letters. The only difference between the two is that you 'C' [see] differently."  -- John Quincy Adams

Awesome Aussie Gangsta Rap: Yo! I'm a Climate Scientist!

Smile when you say that!

A number of people, including my favorite economist, Janie Chermak (whose reputation will now tank), have sent me links to this video featuring some Australian climate scientists. It's hilarious, but the language is quite 'salty' (a euphemism) in some places - four-letter words and all that - so be forewarned. But you can view a 'clean' version.

From Hungry Beast.

 

What's next? Yo! I'm a Water Scientist!

"Ignore the environment. It'll go away." -- Unknown

Reports: 1) Global Dimensions of Change in River Basins; 2) Natural Security

Ken Reid forwarded the following message from Tim Smith, Coordinator of the Sustainable Water Resources Roundtable.

A report has been located from the Global Water System Project, specifically the proceedings The Global Dimensions of Change in River Basins, University Club, Bonn, Germany, Dec. 6-8, 2010.

These proceedings contains 20 papers from various parts of the world. Some selected subjects include:

 

Impact of global change on large river basins;

River flow projections in a changing climate;

Impacts of national and international actors on river basin management;

Effect of changing anthropogenic and climate conditions on BOD loading and water quality; and

Water resources planning and management regions: new insights for defining regions.

 

This report will also be placed on the SWRR Archive Web Site on the '2010 Reports and Publications' page.



 Here is a summary of the GWSP conference.



I also stumbled across the WWW site of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). It has a number of reports addressing security issues and natural resources (including water), climate change, energy, etc. It's an area the Center calls 'natural security':

In the 21st century, the security of nations will increasingly depend on the security of  natural resources, or “natural security.”  This concept paper outlines a new program of study at the Center for a New American Security to look at emerging natural resources challenges in six key areas of consumption and consequences – energy, minerals, water, land, climate change, and biodiversity – as well as the ways in which these challenges are linked together. Any solution to the country’s energy insecurity is likely to involve water, non-fuel minerals, and land-use issues; climate change and biodiversity cut across all concerns, with broad effects on resource vulnerability. Without an integrated, national-level approach that links together natural security challenges, the United States runs the risk of trading one dependency for another and exacerbating the consequences.

So:  natural resources + national security = natural security. Sounds good. Or maybe not. More light reading.

"The impact of climate change is a tremendous risk to the security and well-being of our countries." -- Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)

Video: K.K. Sharma's Recycling Distillation Technique

I recently received this video link  and information from Professor K.K. Sharma [[email protected]].

After watching your website/blog on water issues, I am happy to note that you are generating awareness about importance of water on earth. In order to save water in the laboratories and industries during distillation process where water is used in the condenser unit for cooling purpose and is left in the drain pipe as a waste, I have devised a simple technique for which a video is available for your view and comments on the following link.


The technique uses water collected from the out let of the condenser tube in an earthen pot. From this pot, water is pumped up to supply tank of condenser unit with the help of a small submersible pump. Water is recycled again and again in the cooling process of condenser tube. This way one can save gallons of water during distillation.

 

"A river is the report card for its watershed." -- Alan Levere