The link between water and energy is a key facet of climate change, government and business experts said at the Climate Leadership Conference in San Diego Tuesday.
The conference, held Monday through Wednesday, convened officials from business, government, universities and nonprofits to discuss energy and climate. Session topics ranged from zero-carbon power and identifying climate risks to carbon markets and the energy-water connection.
While scientists expect climate change to alter water supply and distribution, power sources also depend on water to varying degrees. The interplay between those resources can have unexpected consequences, and even destabilize regional politics, speakers said.
“The water footprint will be just as important as the carbon footprint,” said Michael Hightower, leader of the Water for Energy Project at Sandia National Laboratory, which manages national security issues related to nuclear weapons, energy and climate.
Trade-offs of low-carbon energy sources can sometimes include high water use, Hightower said. Nuclear power plants use more water than fossil fuel combustion, and production of biofuels can require a thousand times more water than conventional energy, he said. By contrast, wind and photovoltaic power use now water, he said.
As climate change alters water availability in arid parts of the world, regional disputes over water supply might escalate, he warned. The Golan Heights conflict in Israel is tied to control of aquifers for the Jordan River, Hightower said, and claims to Himalayan snowmelt have fueled the Chinese occupation of Tibet.
In California water and power are intimately linked through the State Water Project, the state’s single largest electricity consumer, said Andrew Schwarz, an engineer for the California Department of Water Resources.
It consumes an average of 5 billion kilowatt hours per year, accounting for about 2 to 3 percent of all electricity consumed in California as it pumps water from Northern California through the Central Valley and over the Tehachapi Range, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. But new projects including solar and wind development along the aqueduct could reduce that, Schwarz said.