Precipitation has been so abundant that Southern California water authorities rescinded emergency restrictions imposed last year on nearly 7 million people that required them to cut back on outdoor watering and to conserve supplies during the historic drought.
One move some cities are making to speed up water-saving efforts in California is to target the areas that produce the most waste. On the residential front, which makes up about 10% of water use in the state, this means lawns.
Stemming the water crisis in the western US will require cities and rural areas to work together to make water use on farms – the largest source of demand – more efficient. Let's have cities pay farmers to install more efficient irrigation systems.
Less than two years after Cape Town's “Day Zero" water crisis, warm, dry weather has prompted South African water suppliers once again to impose emergency conservation measures.
A longtime farmer hopes to save his citrus orchard in the desert town of Borrego Springs, even as the declining aquifer forces major cuts in groundwater pumping.
