Water panel

Climate change and population growth are both stressing the planet’s freshwater supply. 
Our experts debate the tough choices scientists, politicians, and the general public will have to 
make to adapt to a world where water could outstrip fuel as the most prized commodity.

This year, Texas suffered through the worst one-year drought in its history, while states along the Mississippi River endured record flooding. Shifting climate patterns mean these radical disruptions could be a harbinger of things to come. 

DISCOVER recently partnered with NBC Learn, the National Science Foundation, and Arizona State University to convene a town hall discussion that explored the impact of climate change on our freshwater resources. Anne Thompson, NBC’s chief environmental affairs correspondent, moderated the expert panel, which included (from left): Heidi Cullen, a correspondent for Climate Central, a nonprofit that reports on climate science; Bill Richardson, former governor of New Mexico and a board member of the World Resources Institute, an environmental think tank; Grady Gammage Jr., a practicing attorney and a senior scholar at the ASU Global Institute of Sustainability; and Pat Mulroy, general manager 
of the Southern Nevada Water Authority.


Anne Thompson: Water covers more than 70 percent of the Earth, but only 2.5 percent of it is freshwater. And two-thirds of that is locked up in ice caps and glaciers. Freshwater accessible in lakes, rivers, and streams is just six-thousandths of one percent of the world’s total water. With that in mind, what is the status of freshwater around the world today?

Heidi Cullen: Freshwater around the world is definitely stressed, and climate change is the great exacerbation. With water, the rich get richer globally, and the poor get poorer. 
Places that tend toward drought are going to see it more. The subtropical drought regions will expand. And in places like Asia, the monsoon system is expected to intensify. It’s a problem of greater uncertainty, greater variability, and more stress overall.

Thompson: Governor Richardson, do you see water scarcity as a source of global crisis?

Governor Bill Richardson: It is a huge international issue about to explode, and in some areas it’s already a crisis. Look at Somalia, where there is a famine caused by a drought and then militants preventing people from getting water and food. In a country like Bangladesh, where most people live in coastal areas, the opposite is true—there’s too much water, and sometime in this century some of those coastal cities will disappear.

Thompson: Heidi, what areas are at greatest risk for climate change affecting freshwater resources?

Cullen: When we look out to the middle of the century, the models show that the Mediterranean and the Middle East are going to see trouble. Here in the American Southwest, the models seem to agree that we are creeping up on a drier and drier climate.

Thompson: Governor Richardson, do you agree with the idea that the wars of the 21st century will be fought over water?

Richardson: Yeah, I think they will be. We’re facing a growing water crisis in the Middle East, especially in Jordan and in some of the Arab areas adjoining Israel. If we’re talking about human beings dying because of water resources, because of famine, it’s Africa.

Thompson: Is climate change the main reason we are having trouble with freshwater in 
this world?

Cullen: It’s part of an entire orchestra of different issues playing out. Population growth is definitely a really big player. And keep in mind that climate has always changed. In 
the Southwest, paleoclimate records tell us that we have seen tremendous droughts—megadroughts—in the past. When you put climate change on top of that, it just stresses everything more.

Thompson: Here in Phoenix, one of every three homes has a pool, and up to 70 percent of the water is used outside. Water here is cheap. You’re all saying we have to think about water differently and make some difficult choices. Grady, what are those choices?

Grady Gammage Jr.: It’s not that there’s going to be a day when you turn on the tap and water doesn’t come out. We have too robust a water system and too good a political system. But we’re going to have 
to decide how important it is to keep growing, which is how we define success. Should everybody have a private swimming pool? Or should we do the kind of things that Pat [Mulroy] did in Las Vegas when she got people to rip out the grass from their lawns?