The Earth is running out of fresh water.

Droughts in the Southwest and disappearing lakes in the Southeast of America, and increasingly arid areas in other parts of the world.

Australia is copping the rough end of the stick with respect to Global Warming - it never rains in their catchment areas any more; their cash-starved state govt. in New South Wales has just started building desalination plants and that's no solution because they only belch out CO2 and contribute further to Global Warming.

It's become so bad that the UN has forecast two thirds of the world's population will live in areas that are water-stressed by 2030.

Hundreds of billions of dollars will be spent to avoid this crisis. And savy investors will make a fortune.

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Comment by William Jack Jordan on June 14, 2009 at 12:44: piggybacking is an interesting idea as otherwise not all water caught in tanks allotted to individual house/buildings would be used.

Its quite common for us to have floods in the north of the country while there are droughts in the south. 60% of water resources are in the north, where many rivers are un-dammed while in the south pretty well every major river is dammed.

I have a vision of water being redirected from Queensland to the Darling river in NSW, though obviously need to use a white hat to collect of lot of information there about the viability.

Comment by Linda Laird on April 26, 2009 at 0:01: There are five techniques for getting movement:

http://www.edwarddebono.com/PassageDetail.php?passage_id=758&s_name=movement
http://www.edwarddebono.com/PassageDetail.php?passage_id=757&s_name=movement
http://www.edwarddebono.com/PassageDetail.php?passage_id=756&s_name=movement

I typed them as I can't see to get the hyperlink to work you'll have to cut and paste. Ctrl C then Ctrl V

Comment by Phil Bachmann on April 25, 2009 at 20:58: Linda,

po water is more expensive than gold

..is too difficult for me to picture in a way that would provide useful insights. Maybe you could set an easier task for me?

Comment by Phil Bachmann on April 25, 2009 at 20:32: Kim,

3 more yellow hat on water shortages:
- People generally are pushed to take a greater interest in how the economy works.
- Needing to improve their habits can make people more engaged and interesting.
- Greater community engagement as people remind their neighbours that their tap is dripping etc.

Comment by Linda Laird on April 25, 2009 at 13:23: Phil you are assuming the government will always have the money to subsidise. Yes, when we mention 'water' our mindset is that it is free. My goodness we have enough rainfall here in Ireland, our lovely green country to supply half the world (exaggeration) yet in a very warm (warm being an important word here - it never gets warmer than 27o) summer we have water shortages.

Last year the government ran an ad campaign to stop wasting water! It was cheaper than fixing the burst pipes that pump out gallons in the wrong places! In a number of areas we had a break out of cryptosporidium.

It's expensive to build water collection plants and people expect the water to be treated, this is not free and people need to know this (shift perception)

So what do we do in places that it never rains anymore, where it is often war torn and the governments are busy putting money into arms instead?

Good idea Kim pooled water collection points. Perhaps every housing estate built from now on is responsible for their water collection point and has to give 20% back to the mains.

Those who get plenty of it free have to give it away free in a barter for something else another country has.

PO: Water is more expensive than gold

Comment by Phil Bachmann on April 23, 2009 at 23:09: Speaking as an Australian, what you say about water shortages in parts of our country is true, but as regards to 'crisis'...

A few years ago a storm ripped up most of Queensland's banana plantations. Was there a banana crisis? No, because the government subsidised bananas while the plantations rebuilt and all but the wealthy ate less bananas.

In Australia I believe we pay about 1/3 for water consumption (per litre) than you do in the UK. Politicians simply won't put the price up on something that voters have long regarded as being free.