The Big Thirst PDF Download

Author: Charles Fishman
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1439102082
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 418

View

Book Description
Fishmen examines the passing of the golden age of water and reveals the shocking facts about how water scarcity will soon be a major factor.

Author: Terje Tvedt
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0857723081
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 272

View

Book Description
Nourished by fears of global warming and climate change, water has become an issue of urgent international concern. Is flooding across Europe and Asia a warning of more extreme weather conditions in times to come? Will rising sea-levels threaten some of the most densely populated regions of the Earth. And as the world population approaches 7 billion, placing increasing demands on our limited global water supply, will there be conflict over access to water? Fundamental questions about the future of humanity are being asked, and for the first time in history they have to do with the role of water and our ability to control it. In 'A Journey in the Future of Water' leading water expert, TerjeTvedt, explores the impact of our growing water concerns. In a journey that takes him to more than twenty-five countries and across all continents he talks with water experts, politicians and local people to find out more about the ways in which different nations are seeking to respond. From Project Moses, where gigantic underwater gates will rise to prevent the inundation of Venice, to India's River Link Plan, connecting thirty-seven Himalayan rivers to rivers in the south, the author has examined some the world's largest engineering projects, travelled the great river valleys, explored the rain-soaked coasts of Scandinavia and the rain-starved deserts of the Sahara and Oman. From Las Vegas to Lourdes, from Norway to the Nile, he has taken part in water festivals and rituals in Africa and India, travelled to poor nomadic societies and some of the largest cities in the world, in order to better understand this most precious of resources and its determining role in the life of the planet. The result is both one of the most comprehensive and accessible accounts of current and future global water issues and a celebration of water itself.

Author: Steven Mithen
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674072197
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 382

View

Book Description
Water is an endangered resource, imperiled by population growth, mega-urbanization, and climate change. Scientists project that by 2050, freshwater shortages will affect 75 percent of the global population. Steven Mithen puts our current crisis in historical context by exploring 10,000 years of humankind’s management of water. Thirst offers cautionary tales of civilizations defeated by the challenges of water control, as well as inspirational stories about how technological ingenuity has sustained communities in hostile environments. As in his acclaimed, genre-defying After the Ice and The Singing Neanderthals, Mithen blends archaeology, current science, and ancient literature to give us a rich new picture of how our ancestors lived. Since the Neolithic Revolution, people have recognized water as a commodity and source of economic power and have manipulated its flow. History abounds with examples of ambitious water management projects and hydraulic engineering—from the Sumerians, whose mastery of canal building and irrigation led to their status as the first civilization, to the Nabataeans, who created a watery paradise in the desert city of Petra, to the Khmer, who built a massive inland sea at Angkor, visible from space. As we search for modern solutions to today’s water crises, from the American Southwest to China, Mithen also looks for lessons in the past. He suggests that we follow one of the most unheeded pieces of advice to come down from ancient times. In the words of Li Bing, whose waterworks have irrigated the Sichuan Basin since 256 BC, “Work with nature, not against it.”

Author: Sam Dolgoff
Publisher: Black Rose Books Ltd.
ISBN: 9780919618206
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 244

View

Book Description
For a brief period, the Spanish people offered the world a glimpse of a future that differs by orders of magnitude from the tendencies inherent in the state capitalist and state socialist societies that exist today.-Noam Chomsky --Book Jacket.

Author: Angelos N. Findikakis
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 0415619874
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 438

View

Book Description
Groundwater is an indispensable resource in many parts of the world, where it supports domestic water supply, irrigated agriculture and industry. Its increased, and often intensive, use during the last half century has created problems and raised concerns regarding the potential depletion of local aquifers, water quality degradation and various geologic hazards such as land subsidence and sinkholes. This volume includes contributions by experts from several countries who describe different groundwater management practices in their part of the world and discuss measures and actions in response to the challenges associated with the sustainability of groundwater use and the protection of the groundwater environment, as well as the evolution of legal and institutional framework needed for their implementation. It discusses past and present practices and various aspects of the regulatory and legal framework of groundwater management in Japan, China, India, Iran, Australia, the United States, Spain, Denmark, Switzerland and the European Union, and reviews recent efforts to improve the management of transboundary aquifer resources.

Author: Lucia De Stefano
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 0415631521
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 340

View

Book Description
"The world water problems are a due to bad governance, not to physical water scarcity." This book is inspired by this statement and explores whether it holds in a specific country, Spain, where climatic conditions – Spain is one of the most arid countries of the European Union - would fully justify saying that water problems are due to physical water scarcity. The metrification of water uses and their monetary value is a first important step in understanding how reallocation of water among users could help mitigating many of current water problems in Spain. However, water reallocation among users or from users to nature is far from simple. Initiatives portrayed as the solution to the water governance ‘jigsaw’ – e.g. water trade, improved water use efficiency, users collective action, public participation – are not free of difficulties and shortcomings. The book explores the growing need for maintaining Spain’s natural capital and the human component of water governance – people’s needs, wishes, (vested) interests, aspirations – that often determine the result of decisions and, sometimes, lead water management to a deadlock. This book takes a step forward in showing a more complex - and also closer to reality - picture of water governance in Spain.

Author: Paul Preston
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134858655
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 273

View

Book Description
This collection of essays constitutes a magnificent monument to recent scholarship on the Second Republic and the Civil War. It is indispensable for a full understanding of the period.' - Raymond Carr

Author: Donatella Della Porta
Publisher: Policy Press
ISBN: 1447333438
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 232

View

Book Description
Over recent years, social movements formed in response to European neoliberal austerity measures have played an increasingly important role in referendums. This is the first book to bridge the gap between social movement studies and research on direct democracy. It draws on social movement theory to understand the nature of popular mobilisation in referendums. Co-authored by one of the world's leading authorities on social movements, the book uses unique case studies such as the referendum on independence in Scotland, the consultations on independence in Catalonia, the Italian referendum on water, the referendum on the Troika proposals in Greece and the referendum on the debt repayment in Iceland, to illustrate the ways the social movements that formed as a consequence of the 2008 financial crash have affected the referendums' dynamic and results. It also addresses the way in which participation from below has had a transformative impact on the organisational strategies and framing practices used in the campaigns. Looking at general issues of democracy, as well as the political effects of neoliberalism, this topical book is ideally suited to understand the reasons for the Brexit result and will be read by a wide audience interested in social movements, referendums and democratic innovation.

Author: Francisco González-Gómez
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134921578
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 241

View

Book Description
Spain is facing an increasingly difficult situation in terms of water stress. This is an issue that is due mostly to poor management practices in all sectors. Large amounts of water have been used for agricultural purposes at very low prices for too long; there is an uncontrolled use of most aquifers in rural areas which result from ineffective control by the public administration; per capita consumption continues increasing as well as water used for industrial and energy generation, the construction and tourism sectors and for recreation activities. In fact, they have all exerted additional pressure on available water resources. In order to face the above challenges, water policy has made a gradual shift towards more rational and sustainable management of water resources. This has also been influenced by the European Water Framework Directive about which, as the book discusses, there are both myths and misunderstandings. This book analyses the very complex position of all sectors in the country, the alternatives available and the challenges ahead. In so doing, it makes an important contribution to the literature on water resources management. This book was published as a special issue of the International Journal of Water Resources Development.

Author: Robert Hughes
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307764613
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 593

View

Book Description
A monumentally informed and irresistibly opinionated guide to the most un-Spanish city in Spain, from the bestselling author of The Fatal Shore. In these pages, Robert Hughes scrolls through Barcelona's often violent history; tells the stories of its kings, poets, magnates, and revolutionaries; and ushers readers through municipal landmarks that range from Antoni Gaudi's sublimely surreal cathedral to a postmodern restaurant with a glass-walled urinal. The result is a work filled with the attributes of Barcelona itself: proportion, humor, and seny—the Catalan word for triumphant common sense.