EP 736 Will There Be Water For All in the Future?

The current approach to water management is failing to meet the demands of the growing human population and the severe challenges brought on by climate change.  Our guest, David Sedlak, director of the Berkeley Water Center and author of “Water for All: Global Solutions for a Changing Climate” argues that there are solutions to address these water shortages around the globe, but they differ from region to region and call for different technological and policy solutions.  He believes that America, and its built out water infrastructure, is too married to the dams, pipes and systems we built well over a hundred years ago.  He shares with us the creative responses to both our reservoirs above ground and aquifers below ground.  The work going on is extensive and he describes the emerging technologies in desalination to innovations for recycling wastewater and capturing more of the water that falls on fields and cities.  He even describes the in building efforts that may make our use of water in homes net zero in the future.  I found the discussion enlightening and the engineering going on extraordinary.

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