Michael Tae Sweeney: water is a massive problem in arizona but it's almost all for cash-crop agriculture that gets exported out of state. the region has plentiful water to the support the actual human population and industrial uses.

Yes, building U.S. cities in hot deserts w/o water wasn’t a great move - but too few know that HEATING homes uses more energy than COOLING does. Homes in Miami use less energy to control climate than homes in Minneapolis, but we don’t finger-wag about the foolishness of building in cold places.

"Phoenix has lower per capita carbon emissions than Boston" (almost entirely due to heating in Boston) is one of those factoids people get really mad at you if you tell them.

people also don't like hearing that Phoenix has been a continuously inhabited site of fixed agriculture and dense population for several thousands years and is not, in fact, a dumb or unsustainable place to build a city (though it is, in my opinion, unpleasantly hot)

I thought the water supply was more the hot issue?

water is a massive problem in arizona but it's almost all for cash-crop agriculture that gets exported out of state. the region has plentiful water to the support the actual human population and industrial uses.

IIRC it’s similar in Las Vegas/southern Nevada in general, the water use has actually decreased their use of the Colorado river while population has grown. Not just per capita but in total. (By doing things like getting rid of many lawns, which are stupid)

Las Vegas has gotten so good at water conservation the city is now a net *contributor* to the Colorado River, pumping less water out than they allow to run back in

Is there a source on that? From the reporting I can find, it looks like it returns about half of what it takes.

when I was living in the Bay Area, there was huge debate about drought water restrictions and people converting their lawns to more water-friendly native plants. The NIMBYs of course all hated it. Our condo did a conversion & nobody's housing values fell. Hahaha.

It remains absolutely baffling to me that this is economically viable no matter what subsidies are in place.

Like, there has to be a cheaper place in the entire world to grow alfalfa for Saudi livestock or whatever, especially including the shipping costs.

Probably, but then you get the inertia effect. If the farms and the infrastructure & whatnot are already in place, it's a big lift to rebuild all that elsewhere. In theory the government could mandate it, but not in these United States.

it has basically nothing to do with the inertia of how farming works and everything to do with how the legal framework of water rights in the US west work

I can't wait until Yuma becomes a seaside resort town.

I bow to your better-educated opinion on the subject.

Pushing back a bit, Sarah Taber had a now-lost twitter thread once about skilled labor in ag. even if water was priced better, ag would still take a while to adjust to the new costs. californian land is ludicrously expensive compared to e.g. georgia, but ag remains because skill networks are strong

I mean, I'm sure - but still, it's a big planet and even with basically free water because of legal frameworks, Arizona seems like it can't be the best option. But apparently it is! The Saudis aren't doing it for charity.

It has great climate / soil apparently so you get some of the best yields around

Alfalfa Hay: Yield per Harvested Acre by Countywww.nass.usda.gov USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service Information. NASS publications cover a wide range of subjects, from traditional crops, such as corn and wheat, to specialties, such as mushrooms and flowe...

They grow a lot of Alfalfa in Utah where I grew up, and it's 100% because the state refuses to raise water prices despite a severe drought. The Great Salt Lake is drying up & exposing a lakebed made of arsenic dust, and the state's official response is, "God wouldn't let anything bad happen to us."

more pointed question is, what should be done to that land? In a functional society, it would be left to nature more or less. In America, the MAGA gentry who inherited the land are going to maximize profit by using subsidized water to grow cattle feed.

The Saudis owned a lot of it in Arizona!

I know they bought some farms, but I thought it was still aa small percentage? Ends up at the same place, the sellers still got $. Capitalism is going to make more cows until the climate pushes back. It's too big of an industry to shift somewhere more sustainable than Arizona.

Capitalism is always eager to undercut an existing producer when you can make the same thing for lower prices.

Much of human/industrial use which could be closed systems and mostly recaptured. You put it on a field and it's either going into the product or back to the clouds to fall again in Texas/Louisiana.

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