Quote:
Originally Posted by ssiguy
We have seen so many of manufacturers leave the country due to Mexico. So much of what we export to the US can be filled by US suppliers or from the developing world but there is one thing that no other country on the planet has that Canada has in such abundance..........fresh water.
Water could become 21st century commodity that oil was to the 20th. The US West is drying up fast effecting their huge crop revenues and everyone's quality of life. Unlike oil, coal, wood, concrete, or even electric, the world will always need fresh water. All the technological advances in the world will never change that. In short, water could be Canada's goldmine.
Every province and territory has vast amounts of fresh water that 99% of the world could only dream about. It would be a boom to every province so is it time we started to discuss what was always a taboo..........is it time we started to export our fresh water?
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The problem becomes moving it relative to the amount that is used. We move a lot of oil, but use comparatively little volume of oil compared to water.
Water is dense. The energy required to move any volume of it any significant distance (exporting it to areas that need it) soon outweighs the energy required to desalinize water closer to where you need it. This eliminates the possibility of exporting it to places like the Middle East and Australia, not to mention the logistical challenges of transporting it (the fleet of supertankers required would be enormous) and keeping it in reasonably acceptable condition to use (bacteria love to grow in it).
So, you're left with using it within North America. The areas in North America that suffer from water scarcity tend to be in the wrong watershed and over the continental divide - thus you're pumping water against gravity. I'm pretty sure that once you pencil out the numbers, the cost of moving it, not to mention the capital costs of constructing the system would make it uneconomic. Smaller scale systems work (such as California's) because the water source is closer to the point of use and uses gravity to help move it in the direction you want (the cities on the coast of California are at sea level - where the water is headed anyway).
I'd imagine that more efficient use of water would prove to be the solution in those areas - for instance, the farms just outside of Phoenix, AZ use copious amounts of water to irrigate crops in the desert. If water cost rose to the point that farming was uneconomic, I'd imagine the land would be left to go fallow, freeing water resources.
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