Millions of Groundwater Wells Could Run Dry
Freshwater depletion is unlikely to be a real problem in any developed country. State-of-the-art desalination plants in Israel are fulfilling contracts for hundreds of thousands of people at ~$0.40&#x2F;m^3 [1], so $0.40 per thousand liters. The per-capita water usage in the US is ~1200 m^3&#x2F;yr including all indirect water such a industrial, food and food exports [2], with peer nations such a Germany using ~300 m^3&#x2F;yr, and Israel using ~130 m^3&#x2F;yr. That amounts to a ~$480&#x2F;yr increase in yearly expenditure per American which is a ~1.4% increase in base expenditure for the average American which by most metrics would constitute a fairly moderate expense especially for something as critical as food or water. This also assumes that the increase in water prices would not result in a change in water habits similar to other peer countries which are using a fraction of the water per-capita or Israel whose people have already adapted their lifestyles to the expense of desalination.<p>About the only conceivable problems for developed countries relate to scaling up global desalination by a factor of 100x-1000x. However, given the existing scale and maturity in the industry, I find it fairly unlikely that it would not be possible to scale up while maintaining existing prices given a reasonable lead time. Given that it is highly unlikely that any country would preferentially choose to deprive their citizens of water or food unless there were no other choice, this reduces the problem of freshwater depletion to just a problem of power generation and a problem of how to solve it for less-developed countries who might not have the resources to engage in mass desalination. However, I will declare those problems to be out-of-scope for this discussion as they are complex topics in their own right with various proposed solutions and tradeoffs.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.globenewswire.com&#x2F;news-release&#x2F;2020&#x2F;05&#x2F;27&#x2F;2039505&#x2F;0&#x2F;en&#x2F;IDE-Technologies-Secures-the-Sorek-B-Tender.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.globenewswire.com&#x2F;news-release&#x2F;2020&#x2F;05&#x2F;27&#x2F;203950...</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.statista.com&#x2F;statistics&#x2F;263156&#x2F;water-consumption-in-selected-countries&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.statista.com&#x2F;statistics&#x2F;263156&#x2F;water-consumption...</a>