Regardless of which strategies are used, there will be costs. For instance, one study estimates that long-distance transport costs approximately $0.06 to transport a cubic meter of water 100 km (26). Desalinization takes more money and energy, costing between $0.61 and $0.81 per cubic meter for production, depending on the technology. Water efficiency gains are often cheaper and can even save money (27). For instance, one study for California found that 2.5 billion cubic meters of water could be saved for less than $0.50 per cubic meter and 810 million cubic meters could be saved for less than $0.05 per cubic meter (28). Although a full accounting of the costs of addressing water shortage is beyond the scope of this article, Camdessus et al. (29) estimated that from 2003 to 2025 necessary investments to keep up with water needs would exceed $180 billion per year. This study assumed a specific mix of projects to alleviate water shortage, focusing mainly on infrastructure solutions rather than landscape management, and different assumptions would yield different cost estimates.