Sustainability a path to Peace 11122015

Peace Center Thursday November 12, 2015
by
Tony Green
"Sustainability as a path to peace: How
to prevent future wars over our water
supply”
Copyright @ Tony Green 2015

Agenda
1. Is water the next oil?
2. The key to our livelihood
3. Water Scarcity
4. And its associated problems
5. How has it come to this?
6. Have we come to blows over water?
7. Where there is conflict there is resolution but at a price
8. The solutions are….
9. The choice is ours

“Whisky is for
drinking; water is
for fighting over,”

Water – essential for human
survival – is also necessary for
nearly every sector of human
activity, including agriculture,
industrial production and
power generation, and as a key
means for transporting people
and goods.

Less than one percent of the Earth’s drinkable water is readily
accessible for direct human uses.
Earth’s surface is covered by 71% water
Essential for life – can survive only a few days without water
By 2030, 47 percent of the world’s population will be living
in areas of high “water stress.”
http://www.centralia.edu/academics/envscience/envs100Hueckel/envs150N/chap09.ppt. http://peoplestribune.org/pt-news/2015/05/water-is-a-human-right/

Water Scarcity
http://www.centralia.edu/academics/envscience/envs100Hueckel/envs150N/chap09.ppt
Small fraction (.014%) is readily available for human use

Water Scarcity
https://www.ied.edu.hk/esdweb/aids/water.ppt

Water Scarcity
http://www.slideshare.net/LisaMartinez78247/water-presentation-final-ppt
More than one out of six people lack access to
safe drinking water
More than two out of six lack adequate sanitation
3900 children die every day from water-borne
diseases

How have we come to this?

Climate Change

Global Population
As of 9:00 A.M, P.S.T. November 7
7,379,526,826
http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/
80% probability 9.6 billion
and 12.3 billion by 2050
Source: the guardian.com
Growing by 1.18 % per
year, or an additional
83 million people
annually.
Source: United Nations Department of Economic and Social
Affairs/Population Division 1
World Population Prospects: The 2015 Revision, Key Findings and
Advance Tables

Water Use and Source Contradiction
Population and water distribution don’t always correspond,
often leaving highly populated regions with little access to
water.
Asia which has to support 60% of the world population with
only 36% of the worlds water.
The Middle East which has to support 5% of the world
population with only 1% of the worlds renewable water
sources.
Source: http://www.princeton.edu/~ina/infographics/water.html
Source: Water Wars by Diane Raines Ward

History
“Most of the major rivers in Europe
and water, generally
speaking, have been used as
boundaries between countries
throughout history”

Possible end result?
Two main factors for water shortage: dry climate and too
many people. Many people live in hydro poverty – can’t afford
clean water
“Fierce competition for fresh water may
well become a source of conflict & wars
in the future.” Kofi Annan, March
2001
"Many people think that in the middle east is water and
not oil will be the source of the next wars" Allan
Hammond, World Resources Institute

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/23/opinion/23ihtedwatkins. 2570814.html?_r=0&pagewanted=print
Possible end result?

Have we come to blows?In the past 50 years there have been 1,821 instances
of water related interactions between countries,
The vast majority 1,228 ended peacefully.
Only 21 involved actual military violence
(18 between Israel and its neighbors).
http://www.princeton.edu/~ina/infographics/water.html

Despite this gloomy scenario, war is unlikely, according to
history: no nations have gone to war specifically
over water resources for thousands of years.
In The End…
Source : Water, Conflict, and Cooperation: Lessons From the Nile River Basin By Patricia Kameri-Mbote
DOES NOT MEAN THE POSSIBILITY DOES NOT EXIST
FOR WARS IN THE FUTURE

Lake Chad
When it was full,
Lake Chad was the
sixth largest lake in
the world.
But now due to
the declining rain
fall and ever
intensifying
human use it has
shrunk to 1/20 of
its original size
Source: Al Gore’s an inconvenient truth Page 117

Lake Chad
When Nigerian fisherman
followed the receding water
into neighboring Cameroon hey
sparked military fire fights and
international legal disputes.
When farmers began to till the
former lake bottom battles over
property rights erupted.
Source: Al Gore’s an inconvenient truth Page 117

Israel
Copyright @ Tony Green 2015http://www.oilempire.us/water.html
Six day war of 1967
Before it ended Israel had annexed the
Golan heights; it took the West Bank
from Jordan along with one third of the
kingdom most fertile land and it seized
Gaza from Egypt. All of it secured
precious water for Israel.
Arab league angered at Israel
construction of its National Water
Carrier, which appropriated much of
the water of the Jordan River for use in
Israel

Nile River
Egypt and Sudan hold absolute rights to use 100
percent of the river’s water under agreements reached
in 1929 between Egypt and Britain.
Of all the world’s water-deprived regions, none
encompasses more conflicts ongoing and potential than the
lands along the Nile.
Two-Thirds of the African population threatened by
water scarcity and famine.
Ethiopia has 84 percent of the Nile gushing out of its gorges.
Except Egypt none are wealthy enough to build large
water projects without foreign and technical help.

India and Pakistan
India
Pakistan
The Indus
The Indus flows from Himlayan
mountains in Tibet in China to the
Arabian Sea
Shared by India and Pakistan, at the
time of partition (when English rule
ceased and India and Pakistan were
carved up)
India cut off water in 1948. Pakistan
protested; Indian stance was Pakistan
should accept Indian rights over water
Pakistan refused

Solutions
Technology
CooperationCopyright @ Tony Green 2015

Solutions - Desalination
Source: dreamstme.com
Source: ITT Water Equipment Technologies & Flowtronex ITT Flowtronex

Solutions - Desalination

Solutions – Fog Harvesting
Takes advantage of the water vapor which
is in the air we breathe which we normally cannot see

Solutions – Fog Harvesting
http://www.fogquest.org/project-information/current-projects/

Solutions – Indus Water Treaty of 1960
http://inweh.unu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Water-Cooperation-Views-on-Progress-and-the-Way-Forward.pdf
.

Solutions – Trilateral Water Institute

Solutions – 1994 Peace Treaty

Solutions – Interstate Commission for
Water Coordination of Central Asia

Solutions – Nile Basin Initiative
Source : Global Issues Seminar Series January 25, 2006 The Global Water Challenge:Poverty, Growth & International Relations

Solutions - Aquifer

Tie In to Sustainability?
http://sustainability.tufts.edu/wp-content/uploads/Sustainabilityvenndiagram.pdf

Remember the Price
A Soldier’s Last Words: I am sorry that it has come to this
We should demand an end to the abuse of military members and a return to a foreign policy that promotes peace and
prosperity instead of war and poverty. – Congressman Ron Paul

“A drop of water is the basis for living, and
without it there can be no development
and no peace”
- Fadel Kawash – Former
Palestinian Commissioner
for the West Bank

Sustainability a path to Peace 11122015

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