This is a good point but a sad situation. Without a functional state there are many other problems as well.
Today we have energy crisis in Europe and who would expect 5 or 10 years ago that situation will go that bad, that rationing of energy will be considered? There are already some predictions that water scarcity problem will get worse, so it's very good that there are already prototypes that might provide cheap conversion of salt water to clean water. Future seems to be about minimizing costs and decentralization, so we can better sustain all people and save environment.
That's putting it mildly. I recommend the book "When the Rivers Run Dry" if you feel like you don't have enough reasons to despair.
If it had, we'd have used less of them and used more alternatives like insulation. Just like farmers would use less water if they had some incentive to use less than every bit they could get their hands on.