The Water-Energy Conundrum: Can We Satisfy the Need for Both?

The Journal of Energy Security has an article by Allan Hoffman called “The Water-Energy Conundrum: Can We Satisfy the Need for Both.” The article describes some interesting parallels between our water and energy challenges.

This thoughtful article is primarily devoted to providing information that puts global water and energy issues in context. Here are some of my favorite excerpts from The Water-Energy Conundrum: Can We Satisfy the Need for Both:

Current global annual demand for fresh water is estimated to be about 1,000 cubic miles, approximately 30 percent of the world’s total accessible fresh water supply, and has more than tripled in the past 50 years. Some estimate that under business as usual this fraction will increase to 70 percent by 2025. Population growth and economic development are driving a steadily increasing demand for new water supplies, with agriculture accounting for three quarters of global water use on average. Over-pumping of ground water by the world’s farmers, from aquifers in India, China, the US and elsewhere, already exceeds natural replenishment by more than 4 percent of withdrawals and is growing.
…
Another problem is that fresh water is not distributed uniformly around the globe. Some areas have lots, some have little to none. The struggle to control water resources has shaped human history, and water has been a source of tension wherever water resources are shared by neighboring peoples. In addition, precipitation patterns that bring much of the water will change as the climate does. And how those patterns will change is something we are desperately trying to understand. We must also ask how the demand for fresh water is changing and what the implications of not having enough are.
…
Projections by the International Energy Agency, the European Commission, the World Energy Council, the US Energy Information Administration, and others all point to the same general conclusions: there will be increased consumption of all primary energy sources over the next several decades; fossil fuels will remain dominant, accounting for most of the increase in energy use; natural gas demand will grow fastest, but oil will still be the largest individual fuel source; nuclear power will grow, but slowly; global emissions of carbon dioxide will grow more rapidly than primary energy supply; and use of renewable energy will grow rapidly but will not displace fossil fuels as the principal energy source.
…

A useful starting point is to recognize that people do not value energy; they value the services that energy makes possible—heating, cooling, lighting, communication, transportation, and commercial and industrial processes. Thus, energy security must ultimately rest on two principles: using the least amount of energy to provide a given service, and access to technologies that provide a diverse supply of reliable, affordable and environmentally benign energy. This implies that the first priority of any national energy policy must be the wise, efficient use of whatever energy supplies are available, whether fossil, nuclear or renewable. The next priority is new supplies that meet cost, sustainability and environmental requirements. These statements apply equally well to water.

The article also touches on both direct and indirect links between water and energy:

Central to addressing issues of water security—defined as the ability to access sufficient quantities of clean water to maintain adequate standards of food and goods production, sanitation and health—is having the energy to extract water from underground aquifers, push water through pipes and canals, manage and treat impaired water for reuse, and desalinate brackish and sea water to provide new fresh water supplies. Many aspects of energy production depend on the availability of water including hydropower, cooling of thermal power plants, fossil fuel production and processing, biofuels, carbon capture and sequestration, and hydrogen production. The inseparable linkage between energy and water is clear, but it hasn’t always been recognized.

Other, indirect, linkages exist as well between water and energy. Energy production and use can lead to contamination of underground and surface water supplies. If competing water uses limit use of waterways for transport of goods, rail and truck will require more energy to move those goods. Another critical linkage is that energy production and use are major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions which have the potential to disrupt the hydrological cycle and impact global water resources long before other impacts are felt. By altering the timing of winter snows, snowmelt, and spring rains, climate change could overload reservoirs early in the season, forcing releases of water and leaving areas like California high and dry in late summer. Coastal areas and island nations also face a serious threat from rising ocean water levels that destroy property and flood low-lying areas, causing salt-water intrusion of fresh water supplies and putting the drinking water of millions at risk.

Check out: The Water-Energy Conundrum: Can We Satisfy the Need for Both