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Comment by klenwell | Hacker News Reader

I remember seeing a white paper (from some government agency or the RAND institute) back in the 90's (actually probably learned about in some NPR interview) that predicted wars over water starting around the point we are now (approaching 2020). I've seen some news reports that this is already happening. One example being tensions/conflict between Israel and Lebanon. News reports generally treat it as an ideological conflict but this argues looking at the material basis for the conflict.

Another lesser example being legal/political wrangling here in western US among states over Colorado River rights.

It'd be interesting to dig up some of those white papers / predictions and see how credible accurate their predictions like this were.

Not exactly the same thing as climate change but certainly connected.

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The Colorado River rights problems are exactly why "it could happen in the US too" and it isn't just an "international problem" to US audiences. I wouldn't call it a "lesser example" because mini wars (especially if you count industrial sabotage) have been fought over it in the past, and sure California, Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico are friends right now, but given a few more years of droughts in the US southwest and that is likely to change.

Somewhere I’ve read California would like to pipe Great Lakes water into the state... but the Great Lakes states entered into a compact with Canada to make it difficult...

The idea has been kicked around for decades, but now even some notable scientists have warmed up to the idea.

because piping water from a non-renewable lake to a desert is beyond stupid. no need to subsidize building megacities in arid regions

I don’t think it'd be so much (the draught from the lakes) that the St Lawrence becomes a dry wash.

Even if parts of Calif are a desert, they become a fertile deserts with water.

I imagine some revenue sharing scheme could entice some of the states to send some water.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea

People can't drink money.

I know that you’re saying but the Great Lakes basin is not arid like the Aral Sea -whose tributaries were tapped for irrigation. The Great Lakes “overflow” into the st Lawrence which discharges about 7000 m3/sec. at the Ontario outflow.

If California gets great lakes water, every single southwestern state will also ask for it. The intelligent solution is "dont build megacities in the middle of the desert beyond their ability to sustain themselves" rather than "lets invest tons of money into piping fresh water several thousand miles and not address the initial root cause"

Whether people live in CA of the Midwest, water will be consumed. They might even consume less in the arid areas if water has rationing policies. The main obstacle would be infrastructure but it’s not too complicated. It would need lots of pumps to get over the Rockies but it’s doable.

> I imagine some revenue sharing scheme could entice some of the states to send some water.

No need, there is a loophole. Bottled water companies are allowed to pull as much water from the watershed as they want and export it. Michigan charges a $200 per year permit fee. The water bottles are limited in size to be less than 5.7 gallons (21.5 liters).

Nestle bottles 5+ million bottles of water per day and sends it where ever they choose.

Someone could build a railroad loop at the edge of the watershed and have a circular train with millions of 5.7 gallon containers. Fill them up on one side, dump them into a pipeline system on the other. $200 per year.

mini-wars LOL. Such a cute term for such a scourge. Not demonizing your comment, but it made me laugh :D

It is already happening in Central Asia

> But not everyone’s land in the Fergana Valley is fertile. Overuse of water in upstream communities often leaves those downstream parched.

About 1,400 cubic meters of water is supposed to flow along Kok Tal’s irrigation canal each day, yet only half that volume emerges from the neighboring village – an isolated stretch of Uzbekistan surrounded by Kyrgyz territory.

“During the summer time, there are daily conflicts over irrigation water,” said Tynar Musabaev, executive director of the Central Asian Alliance for Water. “They are usually between villages, sometimes inter-ethnic and people have killed each other over irrigation water.”

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kyrgyzstan-water-climatec...

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-37755985

No doubt wars are fought over water. But I think any conflict between Lebanon (and specifically Hezbollah) and Israel is about way more than water.

The way I see it is that they would have a much better chance of finding a way to overcome these ideological/historical differences through trade if they weren't constantly being exacerbated by these more basic economic/environmental issues.

One of the several reasons for Israel occupying Golan Heights was denying Syria access to Sea of Galilee which is a major supply of freshwater. Because of this, I regard that the first wars over water have already been fought, if not entirely for that reason, but as part of the motivation for actions. We are going to see more in the future for sure.

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