Glen Canyon (now Lake Powell)

IMO, this planet has likely exceeded it's load limit as far as humans are concerned. Only if we humans change our life style significantly will our planet be able to continue to support us. This change is likely to be most unpleasant. The longer we put it off the worse it will be.
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I cannot disagree with this however,

Most scientists feel that Earth can support about 10 billion persons. We are currently at 7.425 Billion! Today we added about 214,000 souls, and this year we will add over 80,000,000! Food was thought to be a limiting item, but food production has surpassed what was predicted as the limit only a few years ago. One issue with food is that about 3.5 billion acres (currently or potentially) would produce approximately 2 billion tons of grains annually. That's enough to feed 10 billion vegetarians, but not the omnivores of the Western world...

In 1 AD the population was about 250 million, by 1800 the World population was about one billion. By 1920, it was up to 2 billion. 1958 3 Billion, 1974 four Billion, 1987 5 billion, 1998 6 billion.. With the advent of antibiotics, vaccination, clean water, with increasing longevity and decreasing infant mortality, it began rapidly rise The highest growth rate was in 1963 at about 2.2%--our growth rate has halved to about 1.13% currently--and will continue to decrease.

Interesting that the amount of energy produced also fits under that same curve, yet is not directly correlated.

However, with technology the most of the world can have enough water, but not the way we use it now--and there may have to be population sifts forced by the economics of water. I happen to live surrounded by water, in a area which gets over 64 inches of rain a year with a population density of 450 per sq mile. I moved from Long Beach CA, with 12" of rain a year, and population density of 9,200 people per sq mile... It certainly seems that S. Calif. is beyond the density which can be supported by its water supplies.

So lets really enjoy Lake Powell while we can! Glad to know that the draining of Powell was sabotaged! Unfortunately there was damage to these "plugs" of the diversion tunnels in the 1983 flood events--and it is possible that under the right circumstances, with spillway/diversion tunnel water erosion that the plugs could break...
 
VOX has a good article on how better forecasting can greater increase water supply. Seattle has done a lot of this. Cliff Mass, a weather scientist, has emphasized time and again that we need better short term forecasting, both to increase water supply and to save lives. We need a few more hours and/or a few more days warning of extreme weather outbreaks.

The Army Corps of Engineers did a fantastic job managing the Columbia and Willamette Rivers during the 1996 flood. It was a near thing to disaster for several hours. A few days extra warning would have helped.

http://www.vox.com/2016/5/22/11716002/w ... r-supplies
 
Lake Powell is a magical place. I can't imagine what Glen Canyon must have been like. For more great history and a fantastic story of the area everyone should read "The Emerald Mile." We hope to see all you brats this year in Oak Caynon.
 
thataway":1moxlvk4 said:
IMO, this planet has likely exceeded it's load limit as far as humans are concerned. Only if we humans change our life style significantly will our planet be able to continue to support us. This change is likely to be most unpleasant. The longer we put it off the worse it will be.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

Any discussion of climate change, greenhouse gasses, global warming, etc., that doesn't address population isn't worth listening to, IMO. If you think climate change deniers have their heads in the sand, wait until you mention population. Environmental issues are not really the problem, population is the problem. We could all drive vehicles that got 10 miles to the gallon, if there were 1/10th as many people. But at the rate we are adding vehicle owners around the globe, we will need cars that get 200 miles per gallon in the next decade.

It is depressing to think that we can't solve every problem with technology, but some day we will all agree that we cannot. The earth's population has basically doubled since I was born. It might double again in my lifetime (assuming I live to a ripe old age). Let's say that in the not to distant future the population is 10 times what it is now. Anybody see a looming problem that isn't being addressed? The idea that we are going to "recycle" our way out is silly, but population has replaced politics and religion as the "do not discuss" topic in polite company.

Mark
 
This is a little off topic, but the story from the link to Cliff Mass covers why just about all fire fighting deaths should not have happened. 'Now Forecasting', what the weather is doing from 30 minutes ago to the next hour is essential not just for boating, but for many sectors of the economy.
http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/
 
Go find the book, "the Poplulation Bomb," It was written in the 70's along with many other books about the coming death of the earth by philosophers and junk scientists.

The Earth has a sneaky habit of slapping down anything predicted about it by mere man, scientist or hippy philosopher.

As for me, I've only got a few years left because of age and cancer. I'm going to go out enjoying my boat and my truck and my camper and canoes and other toys and enjoying the great out doors, which other than a proliferation of European and Asian tourists who don't get much further than a quarter mile from the bus, still leaves me in the same kind of country that my father enjoyed in the 30's.

My children and grandchildren don't hunt, a few fish, but most are city slicks who are comfortable in a more constrained world than my world of being a free-range child of the 50's. So future populations will adapt, child bearing will decrease, disease will take its tole on the third world and maybe even in the U.S. So life will go on, and analytical writers 20 years from now will be discussing the follies of 2016 speculators on the future.
 
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