Saving Water | Blue Living Ideas

Senator Kyl Cries Crocodile Tears for Arizona Solar Water Usage

Posted on Aug 24, 2010 by Susan Kraemer.

0

Recent hearings for a proposed 340-MW Hualapai Valley Solar Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) project in western Arizona has brought up water yet again, in a report from Energy Prospects.

Arizona’s Republican Senator Kyl has stepped in to battle against using Arizona’s sun potential for solar CSP. (He was recently famous for saying publicly that we should extend the two trillion dollar tax cuts for the rich rather than extend the unemployment benefits, during the worst recession since the depression).

Senator Kyl claims that solar CSP uses too much water. The plant he opposes would use 800 gallons per MWh, the same as a Palo Verde nuclear plant. Yet he supports the nuclear plant, and even wants Renewable Energy Standards changed so nuclear power qualifies as “renewable”.
[continue reading - Senator Kyl Cries Crocodile Tears for Arizona Solar Water Usage]

Continue Reading

Stop The Water While Using Me!

Posted on Aug 12, 2010 by Scott James.

0

When I used to guide backpacking trips, I worked with a guy who pointed out to our group every morning and every night that they had just brushed their teeth without running water. His point was that they should turn the water off when they brushed their teeth at home. It’s a simple enough idea that saves a lot of water over time, if everyone does it. And now there is a brand of bathroom products that puts that message on the bottle and the tube. The “Stop the Water While Using Me!” Shop is a website that sells just 3 products- shampoo, shower gel and toothpaste- that each have the simple “Stop the Water While Using Me!” message in place of a logo.
[continue reading - Stop The Water While Using Me!]

Continue Reading

Waterboxx Could Save California Winery 145,000 Gallons a Year

Posted on Jun 10, 2010 by Susan Kraemer.

0

A test of an ingenious water saving device invented by Lily grower Pieter Hoff, is being undertaken at Robert Mondavi’s vineyard in California’s Napa Valley, and is expected to save the winery 145,000 gallons of California’s precious water every year. The idea for the Popular Science Invention Award-winning Groasis Waterboxx developed from the way seeds are nurtured naturally in less drought-stressed environments.

Because of climate change, California growers have to plan for a future climate that is moving about a quarter of a mile North every year. If this recreation of Napa’s old climate works, the winery won’t have to move with it.
[continue reading - Waterboxx Could Save California Winery 145,000 Gallons a Year]

Continue Reading

1 in 4 Exxon Shareholders Vote to Know Gas Drilling Risk

Posted on Jun 04, 2010 by Susan Kraemer.

0

As potentially the largest natural gas company in the US, with an imminent $41 billion merger with XTO Energy, Exxon Mobil’s cavalier attitude to fracking risk is a concern to some of its shareholder groups.

At the annual shareholders meeting on May 26th, endorsed by RiskMetrics Group and Proxy Governance, San Francisco-based As You Sow pushed ExxonMobil to disclose what they are doing to reduce risks to drinking water, public health, and shareholder value. They asked for a vote on a proposal asking the company to reveal the environmental and regulatory risks of hydraulic fracturing in drilling for natural gas. Twenty six percent of the Exxon shareholders voted in favor.
[continue reading - 1 in 4 Exxon Shareholders Vote to Know Gas Drilling Risk]

Continue Reading

Is Traditional Water Management the Future?

Posted on May 26, 2010 by Scott James.

0

The world’s water situation is only going to get more challenging in the coming years. There will be more people a water supply that is increasingly polluted and often distributed with aging infrastructure. Clearly we will need to embrace new methods of water management- is it possible that those methods have been around for thousands of years? The International Traditional Knowledge Institute (ITKI), a new research group founded in Bagno a Ripoli, Italy, is teaching that traditional methods from the Sahara, Ethiopia and Babylon will work well with new technologies like solar power.
[continue reading - Is Traditional Water Management the Future?]