Speed blogging

(Before It's News)

1. This list of 170+ scientific ideas ready for retirement is pretty cool. One of them — non-stationarity (mentioned twice) — applies directly to water. The scientists say that the idea of stationarity (a recurring pattern in natural cycles) is often misleading. It would be better to think in terms of eddies and swirls in water, air and climate patterns that sometimes resemble each other but often veer in to unexpected chaos on their way to new “patterns.” What’s the advice for water wonks? Make sure institutions are flexible enough to handle those changes, i.e., be good at adaptation

2. An illuminating post on water logging and canal cleaning in Pakistan, where the British installed overly grand canal systems into the desert
3. Arizona v. California & the Colorado River Compact: Fifty Years Ago, Fifty Years Ahead should clarify their legal complications
4. “Drought-hit California unable to supply state water” (=water projects cannot deliver on contracts) reminds me of my bumper sticker:
   

   The (man-made) shortage is already causing conflict between senior (Exchange Contractors) and junior (Westlands) rights holders, with the Bureau of Reclamation threatening to seize the latter’s water to meet the delivery guarantees of the former. Other farmer, meanwhile, are looking into growing cactus, which may be more realistic than assuming everyone will get their “rights” delivered

5. Using markets to improve environmental water quality (I went up there to talk about all-in-auctions, but they didn’t like such a transparent mechanism; glad to see SOMETHING got done . This post also discusses water quality trading (I looked up some programs; they take 10 years to get going, mostly because standards need to be agreed from scratch.)
6. Here’s my 45 min lecture on the economics of fisheries

H/Ts to BK, RM and MV

• Renault Sells “Only” 10,000 Zoe EVs During First Year Of Availability
• Clean Coal My Foot: Another Coal Related Spill In North Carolina
• Where Time Goes
• Energy Generation At Your Feet With Power Box Pedal Power
• Why Bike In Winter? Here Are Several Reasons (VIDEO)
• Low-Cost Solar Cells Moving Closer Thanks To New Research On Electrodes
• Will Fukushima’s Leaking Radiation Contaminate Tokyo’s Water Supply?
• For 1st Time, Wind Power Provides Over 50% Of Denmark’s Electricity For 1 Month
• Revisiting the Charter of the U.S. Department of Energy (reasons to abolish the agency)
• State Department Assessment Blows Away Keystone Pipeline Foes’ Objections