Replenish

Annotated Table of Contents

Replenish The Virtuous Cycle of Water and Prosperity Sandra Postel

Chapter 1. Water Everywhere and Nowhere

Large dams, diversion canals, flood-control levees and other engineering works have brought enormous prosperity to the world. But they have also broken the water cycle – the way natural systems move, store and cleanse water. Especially with droughts, floods and wildfires intensifying, a healthier water cycle will be critical to reducing societal risks. Fortunately, by working with nature rather than against it, scientists, engineers, cities and farmers are pioneering new approaches to building water security for this century of rapid change.

Chapter 2. Back to Life

The Colorado is one of a number of major rivers around the world that no longer reach the sea for extended periods of time. The Colorado Delta, once a lush wetland supporting an abundance of life, has dried out. This chapter takes a deep dive into a pioneering, bi-national experiment to restore portions of the delta using innovative science, policy and management.

Chapter 3. Put Watersheds to Work

Watersheds function as nature’s water factories – collecting, storing, and cleansing water as it flows through the landscape. This chapter looks at groundbreaking restoration efforts in the erosive Loess Plateau of China, the fireprone headwaters of the Rio Grande in New Mexico, and New York’s CatskillsDelaware watershed, where land-protection investments have saved New York City billions of dollars in avoided water treatment costs.

Chapter 4. Make Room for Floods As floods intensify, more cities and towns are realizing that dams and levees may no longer provide the protection from inundation they once did. Across the

Danube River basin in Europe, the Mississippi watershed in the US heartland, and smaller basins like California’s Napa River, scientists, conservationists and government officials are working together to give rivers room to flood.

Chapter 5. Bank It for a Dry Day

Groundwater depletion is one of the biggest threats to global food and water security. This chapter explores where depletion is occurring, and how serious a threat it poses. It then looks at creative efforts in California and India to replenish and protect this critical water supply.

Chapter 6. Fill the Earth

Globally, soils can hold eight times more water than all the world’s rivers combined. But this critical reservoir has shrunk due to deep plowing of farm fields, wind and water erosion, and the overgrazing of cattle. A quiet revolution is taking place to grow crops and graze livestock in ways that regenerate soils so as to increase their water-holding capacity, sequester more carbon, reduce chemical inputs, and build agriculture’s resilience to droughts and floods.

Chapter 7. Conserve in the City Cities account for 10 percent of global water use, but their concentrated demand places great strains on surrounding water sources. Conservation, efficiency, wastewater reuse, and storm-water capture are driving down urban demand, negating the need for costly new water supply projects, and repairing the urban water cycle.

Chapter 8. Clean It Up Farm and lawn fertilizers, septic systems, wastewater treatment plants, and livestock operations have overloaded the water cycle with nitrogen and phosphorus, leading to algal blooms and dead zones that threaten fisheries and human health. This chapter explores the technologies, policies and management practices that can clean up the waters.

Chapter 9. Close the Loop As water shortages spread, water security will depend on taking the waste out of wastewater. From “sewer mining” to the recycling of urban wastewater for farm irrigation, wastewater is increasingly managed as a valuable new supply.

Chapter 10. Let It Flow

Dams and diversions that have altered and depleted river flows pose grave risks to freshwater life. This chapter examines the strategic removal and reoperation of dams, along with strategies from the Murray-Darling Basin in Australia to the Flint and Connecticut River Basins in the eastern United States to improve river health and habitat while sustaining local economies.

Chapter 11. Rescue Desert Rivers

The Gila, San Pedro and Verde Rivers are lifelines for fish, birds and wildlife in the dry, southwestern United States, and also supply needed irrigation water for farms and ranches. Working together, farmers and conservationists are showing that smarter water management can simultaneously benefit agriculture, recreation, fish and wildlife, and local economies – upending the notion that it’s all about fighting for the last drop.

Chapter 12. Share

Water is the basis of life. It is finite, and there are no substitutes for it. This chapter discusses the moral imperative of adopting policies, strategies and a guiding ethic to share water with all of life.