Water Supply & Land Use

Throughout history, rivers have been our foremost source of fresh water both for agriculture and for individual consumption, but now economists say that by 2025 water scarcity will cut global food production by more than the current U.S. grain harvest. In this groundbreaking book, veteran science correspondent Fred Pearce focuses on the dire state of the world's rivers to provide our most complete portrait yet of the growing world water crisis and its ramifications for us all.

Pearce traveled to more than thirty countries while researching When the Rivers Run Dry, examining the current state of crucial water sources like the Indus River in Pakistan, the Colorado River in the United States, and the Yellow and Yangzte rivers in China. Pearce deftly weaves together the complicated scientific, economic, and historic dimensions of the water crisis, showing us its complex origins-from waste to wrong-headed engineering projects to high-yield crop varieties that have saved developing countries from starvation but are now emptying their water reserves. He reveals the most daunting water issues we face today, among them the threat of flooding in China's Yellow River, where rising silt levels will prevent dykes from containing floodwaters; the impoverishment of Pakistan's Sindh, a once-fertile farming valley now destroyed by the 14 million tons of salt that the much-depleted Indus deposits annually on the land but cannot remove; the disappearing Colorado River, whose reservoirs were once the lifeblood of seven states but which could dry up as soon as 2007; and the poisoned springs of Palestine and the Jordan River, where Israeli control of the water supply has only fed conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

The situation is dire, but not without remedy. Pearce argues that the solution to the growing worldwide water shortage is not more and bigger dams but greater efficiency and a new water ethic based on managing the water cycle for maximum social benefit rather than narrow self-interest.

Turn water scarcity into water abundance!
Earthworks are one of the easiest, least expensive, and most effective ways of passively harvesting and conserving multiple sources of water in the soil. Associated vegetation then pumps the harvested water back out in the form of beauty, food, shelter, wildlife habitat, and passive heating and cooling strategies, while controlling erosion, increasing soil fertility, reducing downstream flooding, and improving water and air quality.
Building on the information presented in Volume 1, this book shows you how to select, place, size, construct, and plant your chosen water-harvesting earthworks. It presents detailed how-to information and variations of a diverse array of earthworks, including chapters on mulch, vegetation, and greywater recycling so you can customize the techniques to the unique requirements of your site.
Real life stories and examples permeate the book, including:

How curb cuts redirect street runoff to passively irrigate flourishing shade trees planted along the street

How check dams have helped create springs and perennial flows in once-dry creeks

How infiltration basins are creating thriving rain-fed gardens

How backyard greywater laundromats are turning "wastewater" into a resource growing food, beauty, and shade that builds community, and more

How to create simple tools to read slope and water flow

More than 225 illustrations and photographs

When Henry David Thoreau went for his daily walk, he would consult his instincts on which direction to follow. More often than not his inner compass pointed west or southwest. "The future lies that way to me," he explained, "and the earth seems more unexhausted and richer on that side." In his own imaginative way, Thoreau was imitating the countless young pioneers, prospectors, and entrepreneurs who were zealously following Horace Greeley's famous advice to "go west." Yet while the epic chapter in American history opened by these adventurous men and women is filled with stories of frontier hardship, we rarely think of one of their greatest problems--the lack of water resources. And the same difficulty that made life so troublesome for early settlers remains one of the most pressing concerns in the western states of the late-twentieth century.
The American West, blessed with an abundance of earth and sky but cursed with a scarcity of life's most fundamental need, has long dreamed of harnessing all its rivers to produce unlimited wealth and power. In Rivers of Empire, award-winning historian Donald Worster tells the story of this dream and its outcome. He shows how, beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, Mormons were the first attempting to make that dream a reality, damming and diverting rivers to irrigate their land. He follows this intriguing history through the 1930s, when the federal government built hundreds of dams on every major western river, thereby laying the foundation for the cities and farms, money and power of today's West. Yet while these cities have become paradigms of modern American urban centers, and the farms successful high-tech enterprises, Worster reminds us that the costs have been extremely high. Along with the wealth has come massive ecological damage, a redistribution of power to bureaucratic and economic elites, and a class conflict still on the upswing. As a result, the future of this "hydraulic West" is increasingly uncertain, as water continues to be a scarce resource, inadequate to the demand, and declining in quality.
Rivers of Empire represents a radically new vision of the American West and its historical significance. Showing how ecological change is inextricably intertwined with social evolution, and reevaluating the old mythic and celebratory approach to the development of the West, Worster offers the most probing, critical analysis of the region to date. He shows how the vast region encompassing our western states, while founded essentially as colonies, have since become the true seat of the American "Empire." How this imperial West rose out of desert, how it altered the course of nature there, and what it has meant for Thoreau's (and our own) mythic search for freedom and the American Dream, are the central themes of this eloquent and thought-provoking story--a story that begins and ends with water.

THE DRINKING WATER BOOK takes a level-headed look at the serious issues surrounding America's drinking water supply. Unlike water purifier manufacturers and public health officials, Ingram presents unbiased reporting on what's in your water and how to drink safely. Featuring all the latest scientific research, the book evaluates the different kinds of filters and bottled waters and rates specific products on the market.• The completely revised comprehensive guide to making tap and bottled water safer, covering the toxins in our water, how to test for them, and how to get rid of them.• Honestly and thoroughly tackles a subject vital to ongoing environmental, health, and safety concerns.• Shows how to avoid bogus safety tests, scams, and unnecessary expenditures.• Details which toxins aren't regulated by federal and state water standards.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

What else but a pond can simultaneously increase your aesthetic pleasure, offer recreational opportunities, help the environment by providing wildlife habitat, and increase the value of your land? Tim Matson's classic guide Earth Ponds, first published in 1982, remains the standard reference for pond owners and builders. Here is everything you need to know to plan, dig, sculpt, maintain, and enjoy your pond, and how to to keep it healthy for years. The Earth Ponds Source-book presents hundreds of additional tips, techniques, and resources, including how to plan a pond to attract wildlife; where to buy equipment and materials; how to build rafts, docks, and gazebos, and how to deal with common problems like weeds, algae, and crayfish.

Water is overused and abused globally. According to the World Bank, "the wars of the next century will be about water." Water usage doubles every twenty years, yet more than thirty countries face water stress and scarcity, and over a billion people lack adequate access to clean drinking water. At a time when Canadian corporations and politicians are planning the export of our precious resource, this new book by "the world's most prominent radical scientist" (The Guardian) will provide Canadians with a thorough introduction to the key issues. Shiva warns that water privatization threatens cultures and livelihoods worldwide. She calls for a movement to preserve water access for all, and offers a blueprint for global resistance.

This guide to over 100 waterfalls in the White Mountains of New Hampshire tells the best times of year and vantage points from which to view them, and also gives suggestions for further hikes, swimming holes, and uncrowded picnic spots.

Excursions range in length from a short stroll from the car to a hike of nearly 20 miles across the Presidential Range. Each chapter includes complete hiking information: distance, difficulty, altitude gain, and trail directions; as well as a map, essays on local history and lore.

A passionate call to action from one of the leading voices in the global struggle for universal access to the earth's most vital element—a sequel to the acclaimed Blue Gold.

"Life requires access to clean water; to deny the right to water is to deny the right to life."—from the introduction to Blue Covenant

In their international bestseller Blue Gold, Maude Barlow and co-author Tony Clarke exposed how a handful of corporations are gaining ownership and control of the earth's dwindling water supply, depriving millions of people around the world of access to this most basic of resources and accelerating the onset of a global water crisis.

Blue Covenant, the sequel to Blue Gold, describes a powerful response to this trend: the emergence of an international, grassroots-led movement to have water declared a basic human right, something that can't be bought or sold for profit.

World-renowned activist Maude Barlow is at the center of this movement, which is gaining popular and political support across the globe, encompassing protests in India against U.S. bottling giant Coca-Cola; in Bolivia against the water privatization scheme of European water conglomerate Suez; against the use of water meters in South Africa; and over groundwater mining in Barrington, New Hampshire, and dozens of other communities in North America.

With great passion and clarity, Barlow traces the history of these international battles, documents the life-and-death stakes involved in the fight for the right to water, and lays out the actions that we as global citizens must take to secure a water—just world—a "blue covenant"—for all.

An award-winning nature writer weaves natural history and personal experience into the dramatic story of the last days of six North American bird species. With a compelling blend of science, history, politics, and memoir, Cokino draws on unpublished photographs and documents to make these long-vanished birds come alive.