Water
California's interconnected water system is the world's largest, managing over 40,000,000 acre feet of water per year, centered on six main systems of aqueducts and infrastructure projects. Water use and conservation in California is a politically divisive issue, as state experiences periodic droughts and has to balance the demands of its large agricultural and urban sectors, especially in the arid southern portion of the state. The state's widespread redistribution of water also invites the frequent scorn of environmentalists.
The California Water Wars, a struggle between Los Angeles and the Owens Valley for water rights, is one of the most well-known examples of the lengths people will go to in order to secure adequate water supplies. Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said: "We've been in crisis for quite some time because we're now 38 million people and not anymore 18 million people like we were in the late 60s. So it developed into a battle between environmentalists and farmers and between the south and the north and between rural and urban. And everyone has been fighting for the last four decades about water."
Read more about this topic: California, Infrastructure
Other articles related to "water":
... consisting of fine granular material (such as sand or silt), clay, and water ... When water in the sand cannot escape, it creates liquefied soil that loses strength and cannot support weight ... Quicksand can be formed in standing water or in upwards flowing water (as from an artesian spring) ...
... Water is used in literature as a symbol of purification ... Sherlock Holmes held that "From a drop of water, a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the other." ...
... of the 20th century, synchronized swimming was known as water ballet ... which were equipped with huge on-stage water tanks for the purpose ... with various diving actions and stunts in the water, Katherine Curtis started one of the first water ballet clubs at the University of Chicago, where the team began executing strokes, "tricks ...
... From 1901 to 1964, the litre was defined as the volume of one kilogram of pure water at 4 °C and 760 millimetres of mercury pressure ... held at Sèvres in France and was intended to be of the same mass as the 1 litre of water referred to above ... Additionally, the mass-volume relationship of water (as with any fluid) depends on temperature, pressure, purity, and isotopic uniformity ...
... shale, oil operators force 1 to 9 million US gallons (34,000 m3) of water mixed with a variety of chemicals through the wellbore casing into the shale ... The high pressure water breaks up or "fracks" the shale, which releases the trapped gas ... Sand is added to the water as a proppant to keep the fractures in the shale open, thus enabling the gas to flow into the casing and then to the surface ...
Famous quotes containing the word water:
“The history of persecution is a history of endeavors to cheat nature, to make water run up hill, to twist a rope of sand.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I’d take off all my clothes
& cross the damp cold lawn & down the bluff
into the terrible water & walk forever
under it out toward the island.”
—John Berryman (1914–1972)
“Compare society to a boat. Her progress through the water will not depend upon the exertion of her crew, but upon the exertion devoted to propelling her. This will be lessened by any expenditure of force in fighting among themselves, or in pulling in different directions.”
—Henry George (1839–1897)