Letters
this water lies below our
Water not everywhere
From Henry Northover, WaterAid
As Jonathan Chenoweth reported,
the water crisis is not a crisis of
scarcity yet but a crisis of access,
fuelled by weak international
leadership (23 August, p 28). There
is enough fresh water but the
poorest billion people are missing
out: 1 person in 8 does not have
access to safe water, leading to at
least 5000 preventable child
deaths a day.
Chenoweth draws attention
to the importance of sustainable
management of water resources
but at the very heart of this must
be a clear commitment to protect
the human right to water.
Chenoweths own research into
how water scarcity impacts on
national economic development
is interesting. The World Bank has
recently estimated that lack of
access to drinking water and
sanitation alone are costing
developing countries up to
9 per cent of their potential GDP.
London, UK
From Iain Climie
There are clearly many ways to
increase water availability on
paper and to address other vital
topics such as food supplies,
habitat conservation and climate
change. Discussions on these
concerns often omit two key
questions: who gets the job
and who pays the bill? If
responsibility for an important
task is not clearly defined and
agreed it will be done late, badly
or not at all.
Exactly who is going to take
on such burdens, especially as
responsibility can rapidly turn
to blame if things go wrong?
Whitchurch, Hampshire, UK
From Bob Williamson,
www.greenhouseneutral.net
As the driest inhabited continent,
suffering the catastrophe of the
dying Murray Darling river
system, Australia requires a major
rethink of water practices.
Chenoweth, in quantifying needs
and consumption, misses a drier
point on virtual water. Much of
20 | NewScientist | 13 September 2008
perception, embodied in the
products we consume and often
discard once their intended single
use has been fulfilled. We thus
dump billions of litres into
landfill daily. In Australia, the
government then provides
inappropriate, out of date, short-
sighted subsidies for industries
whose continued operations and
theft of this precious resource
should be outlawed.
Even Fred Pearce, looking in
detail at the cost of his beer can
on his environmental blog (New
Scientist online, 8 May 2007),
missed the water link in
calculating the full environmental
impact footprint of his six-pack.
The Australia Institute in 2002
reported that of the countrys
output of 1.76 million tonnes of
smelted aluminium in 2000,
1.42 million tonnes was exported.
This industry consumes 15 per
cent of Australias total annual
energy output and exports
embodied water unabated while
the Murray Darling dies.
Stoneville, Western Australia
From Harro Drexler
Jonathan Chenoweth failed to
discuss the water needed just to
maintain ecologially sensitive
areas such as marshes, which are
all under stress in Australia.
He also claims that food self-
sufficiency is no longer important
because of the virtual water
trade but the cost of transport
will increase with energy costs,
and subsidies to farmers cannot
be afforded for ever.
Roseville, New South Wales,
Australia
When surveillance is carried to
How green is that fuel?
From David Roser
Environmental scientists have
long criticised economists failure
to address externalities in abandon the fight for any human
particular their failure to account
adequately for environmental
and social impacts. Climate
change at last seems to be altering
economists perspectives, as seen
by the degree to which the UKs
Stern report and Australias
Garnaut report are being taken
seriously at a political level.
So where is the serious
consideration of externalities
by biofuel technologists, who
should know better? David
Strahans report of biofuel
proposals (16 August, p 34)
illustrates the problem well.
Consider algae. Where is this flat
land free to be flooded in order to
grow it? Will this land be taken
out of food production? What
ecosystems would be lost? What
would be the methane production
in the anaerobic sediments
created? Where would the
feedwater be sourced and the
waste water disposed of?
Marrickville, New South Wales,
Australia
From Ronald Saltz
David Strahan suggested a choice
of Jatropha nuts or algae as the
best replacement for aviation
fuel. With the advent of gene
splicing, the word and could
replace or when there are two
or more good genetic choices.
Algae with the most favourable
Jatropha genes should be the
optimal solution, unless better
genes present themselves.
New York City, US
Privacy indivisible
From Richard Stallman
The Siemens Intelligence
Platform (23 August, p 24) does
not carry out surveillance of the
public, it only facilitates analysis
of whatever surveillance is done,
whether justified or not. That
makes it a side issue. The real
problem is the surveillance itself.
the point of injustice, as it is today
in the US, UK and China, it is not
enough to oppose further
increments in surveillance. If we
right once it has been denied,
tyranny is assured.
The UK must re-establish the
expectation that the public ought
not generally to be identified,
watched and tracked just as it
must re-establish the right to
remain silent when under arrest,
the right not to be subjected to the
double jeopardy of being retried
after an acquittal, the right not to
be imprisoned on mere suspicion
or for possessing an article in
circumstances which give rise to a
reasonable suspicion that [it] is
for a purpose connected with the
commission, preparation or
instigation of an act of terrorism
and the right not to be tortured.
Cambridge, Massachusetts, US
Open mind
From Gerald Marsh
Lawrence Krausss commentary
on the appearance of Christopher
Moncktons piece on global
warming in the newsletter of the
American Physical Societys
Forum on Physics and Society
(16 August, p 46) could be read as
implying that I should have
warned the editors that Monckton
is a controversial figure.
To clarify the record, here is
what I wrote to the editors about
recommendations for those who
could contribute to the debate on
the side of those who do not see
global warming as a threat:
I have had direct contact with
only three people. I would
recommend you contact: Willie
Soon at Harvard, Christopher
Monckton, and Freeman Dyson at
the Institute for Advanced Study.
Willie is an astronomer and
Christopher has a background
in science. He is a bit of a
controversial figure (challenges
Al Gore to debate him in ads in
The New York Times and other
major media) and is also known as
Viscount Monckton of Brenchley.
www.newscientist.com