How To Fix The Water Crisis | CNBC Marathon

From floods to droughts, CNBC Marathon explores the water crisis in the U.S.

Today, one out of three people don’t have access to safe drinking water. And that’s the result of many things, but one of them is that 96.5% of that water is found in our oceans. It’s saturated with salt, and undrinkable. Most of the freshwater is locked away in glaciers or deep underground. Less than one percent of it is available to us. So why can’t we just take all that seawater, filter out the salt, and have a nearly unlimited supply of clean, drinkable water?

The western U.S. is experience a megadrought so severe, it is the driest two decades in at least 1,200 years. And no sector has felt the impact more than agriculture, which takes up about 70% of the world’s freshwater. With water resources becoming more scarce, several companies are working to improve irrigation efficiency and help sustain food production in a future where extreme climate may be more common.

Water is a cornerstone of economic activity, and when it runs low, communities face tough choices. The extreme drought conditions in the U.S. West are straining water resources and providing a fertile ground for wildfires. How will the West Coast face this climate challenge?

And 2020 was the busiest hurricane season on record. Flooding is one of a storm’s most devastating consequences. FEMA estimates one inch of flood water can cause up to $25,000 in damage. The U.S. began offering national flood insurance in 1968 but the program, called the NFIP, is now over $20 billion in debt. Private companies are starting to offer flood insurance as well. However, flood insurance is more complicated than it may appear. Watch the video to better understand how flood insurance works, and doesn’t work, in the U.S.

Chapters:
00:00 — Introduction
00:30 — Can Sea Water Desalination Save The World? (Published October 2019)
14:00 — U.S. Farms Waste A Lot Of Water — But This Tech Could Help (Published September 2022)
29:56 — How The West Coast Drought Could Cause More ‘Water Wars’ (Published July 2021)
40:07 — Why Flood Insurance Is Failing The U.S. (Published November 2020)

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How To Fix The Water Crisis | CNBC Marathon

[nathancochran]

This speaks to a larger problem within the US. Everybody wants the benefits of publicly funded infrastructure, but nobody wants to pay for it, and nobody wants to pay for it while it is getting built and cannot be immediately used.
So our infrastructure ages and decays past the point of being unusable, then the same people complain about that too.

[easyrider]

I live in a high humidity location. I have looked at building a solar powered dehumidifier pulling water from the air into a water tower. It would require adding minerals for drinkability, but could provide 100+ gallons of water daily.

Water solutions will end up being location specific as we get more and more efficient with water management.

[harishrv]

Creating water scarcity versus making water availability (sanatan ideology) will make huge difference and impact in lives around the globe.

[MusikCassette]

desalination comes together, when you have a lot of Renewable energy, and you use the desalination, to balance the production variations.

[longbeach]

Population is an issue with more people consuming more water. Also water bottle companies are hogging up water so they can profit off your basic need.

[randallbermudez]

All farmers in the world should have drip irrigation.

[joejoey]

Water desalination is incredibly cheap but has a high initial cost, private companies aren’t willing to pay the upfront costs to establish the facilities for a low return on investment

[Ziqver]

Maybe time to treat water with respect and NOT let greedy corporations poison our waters.

[mech-E]

Better use of water resources is essential. We need to be better at maintaining the natural systems which support a healthy and balanced water cycle to keep aquifers charged and local climates stable. We need to reverse the damage done by centuries of poor water and forest management too.

[konstantinhuwa]

Is it not more in trend, to plant windbrakes? Along roads, rivers, canals, between agricultural cultures and so on? 21:11 22:00 27:36 28:20 Sooo big areas, and no one tree, nothing from windbrakes! I have learned in the school, that first approach against drought and soil erosion are windbrakes, and nobody use it anymore, and crying about problems!

[chunlee]

One easiest way to save water in southern California is to outlaw lawns, as Las Vegas has done.

[frederickkearney]

As long as we provide public fund subsidies to build or insure in either flood or fire prone areas, we will encourage continuing growth in them. As is the case with earthquake insurance, the premium cost must be risk based such that the insureds, not the public at large, pay the full cost of building in vulnerable areas. The government's job is to identify at risk locations and educate the public where the high risks are, allowing people to avoid purchasing homes and businesses in those locations. If they choose to purchase high risk properties, they should bear the risk and socialize it with unsubsidized private insurance.

[narithshan]

Why they don’t get salt from brine? It’s get more salt than sea water.

[bchris]

Here’s an idea. Stop moving to deserts

[louisebarnes]

Condensation of the humidity was practiced by the Incas of Peru. They built circular terraces which condensed the humidity as it swirled downward, getting colder, then condensing and therefore watering the crops. Also, circular terraces were used for collecting water in a basin at the bottom of the terrace, then having it flow through a canal for drinking water. Today, there are newer ways to condense humidity into water for agriculture and drinking water. The humidity cannot be seen, just like oxygen and CO2, but it is there for everyone. Growing desert grass 40” x 40” grids would anchor sand, gets watered by morning dew, could help trees to grow within it, and may eventually help rain to occur. Also, solar-powered refrigeration units could cool tanks of water that flows through pipes, causing drip irrigation by condensing humidity.

[davidgerardstack]

A graphic with a marginal supply curve for clean water would help a lot, necessarily regional

[randallbermudez]

All coastal countries in the world should have desalination plants.

[danielman]

Stop trying to make this harder than it is

[johnhays]

We at Pure Water For All Foundation have been working on this problem for decades in over 50 countries. We have fantastic results.

[ingoos]

There was also the idea of desalination by accelerating evaporation by spraying seawater on a solar-heated rotating drum....