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Carrying Capacity
May. 16th, 2014 12:48 pmSlate online magazine is running an interesting series on the ongoing drought in the American Southwest. There are eight linked articles so far, each worth a read, but to me they all add up to one thing: we have exceeded the carrying capacity of the Southwest.
In ecology, carrying capacity is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water and other necessities available in the environment. Now, for non-sentient species, exceeding the carrying capacity usually results in a die-off of the species. In humans, this is not necessarily the case.
First, we could increase the carrying capacity of the land in question. Water desalinization on a large scale is possible. I've often thought of building large pipelines carrying de-salted water north from the Gulf of California to Phoenix. Second we could use less water. Third, some of the people in the Southwest could (and in California's case are) moving elsewhere.
In short, the lack of carrying capacity in the Southwest can be fixed relatively painlessly. But like many other problems, the longer we wait and fiddle around, the more pain we'll experience.
In ecology, carrying capacity is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water and other necessities available in the environment. Now, for non-sentient species, exceeding the carrying capacity usually results in a die-off of the species. In humans, this is not necessarily the case.
First, we could increase the carrying capacity of the land in question. Water desalinization on a large scale is possible. I've often thought of building large pipelines carrying de-salted water north from the Gulf of California to Phoenix. Second we could use less water. Third, some of the people in the Southwest could (and in California's case are) moving elsewhere.
In short, the lack of carrying capacity in the Southwest can be fixed relatively painlessly. But like many other problems, the longer we wait and fiddle around, the more pain we'll experience.
