干燥的田野和逐渐减少的水库在整个美国都变得太普遍了，因为多年以下的长期干旱在多年以下的公司，农场和市政当局散开。现在干燥条件恶化affect two-thirds德克萨斯州加利福尼亚的历史干旱shows no signs of improvement. Exceptional to moderate drought conditionsextend从俄克拉荷马州北穿过明尼苏达州的口袋里。在科罗拉多州，The Denver Post写, “comparisons to the Dust Bowl are no longer hyperbole — they're accurate.”

多年危险生活, a new Showtime series about climate change, turned its lens on how drought devastated the small town of Plainview, Texasin its first episode，昨晚播出。干旱驱动了嘉吉牛肉加工厂 - 普莱维尤最大的雇主 -to closein 2013. More than 2,000 jobs disappeared in a town of 22,000.

In Plainview—and every other drought-stricken place across the United States—a precipitous drop in rainfall is only part of a much broader story. Underlying water stress is one important piece of that complicated puzzle. When drought strikes where baseline water stress is high, it exacerbates regions’ water woes.

Click map to view larger version.
Click map to view larger version.

Plainview在透视上

As drought withered once-rich grazing lands and increased feed prices across Texas, ranchers had to sell their herds to stay in business. The state’s cattle herds are now at their lowest level in half a century, the Showtime episode explained. That meant less business for Cargill.

The company’s now-shuttered Plainview plant sits within the Brazos River basin. The Brazosis the longest river in Texas—and what the show didn’t mention is that the river is also extremely water-stressed.

WRI的渡槽项目最近评估，映射和评分应力on water supplies in the world’s 100 largest river basins. The Brazos ranked 13th most stressed among the world’s largest rivers. The river’s extremely high stress level means that 80 percent or more of its naturally available surface water supply is already being used by farms, homes, businesses, and energy producers.

因此，盆地中的所有用户都竞争有限的资源。因此，即使在非干旱条件下，Plainview和周边地区也会引起人们的关注。而基础架构和管理干预措施，例如水再利用系统—can help improve water access in the area, the fundamental reality is that all users are extremely vulnerable to changes in available supply, such as those that occur during drought.

A National Trend

Plainview’s plight is emblematic of a broad, national trend. Drought and water stress overlap in many regions facing water shortages in the United States. The Aqueduct project shows that 66 percent of California’s irrigated agriculture暴露了to extremely high water stress. Two of the United States’ largest river basins also face extremely high stress – the Colorado and the Rio Grande—which provide water supplies to eight states. More than 30 million people depend on the Colorado alone for water. Both of these rivers rank in thetop 18 most-stressed river basinsaround the world, when analyzed by population.

And these risks are projected to increase. Climate change will generally make precipitation更极端，可变和不可预测在未来的几年中。此外，平均温度更热意味着土壤较干，因此农场可能面临更大的农作物和牧场主的风险即使更定期下雨.

How Can We Ensure a Water-Secure Future?

There is hope, however, for solutions. As the steady stream of national-level coverage and this video series demonstrate, national awareness amongst all stakeholders is starting to build – from individual water users, to politicians and business people, to celebrities like Don Cheadle, who hosted the Plainview story.

这种关注只能帮助进一步的一些方法，旨在使水需求更加与农业，工业和市政当局的可用供应相符。例如，一些公司开始意识到水风险对其底线产生了严重的影响。卡吉尔现在participatesin the CDP’s water-risk disclosure program. Tools like CDP’s survey are essential as more and more investors seek water-risk information and companies take water risk evaluation and mitigation more seriously. California is among the statesleading the way在研究减少需求策略中。在澳大利亚，这是另一个臭名昭著的干旱热点，政府已经大力投资于水效率，并创造了一个innovative water-rights trading system限制总体需求并为周围环境保存水。

无论干旱和水压力重叠，减少用水都是迈向长期经济，社会和政治稳定的重要一步。我们开始找出解决世界上的水灾的解决方案，但是真正创造水上安全的未来将需要更多的信息，研究和创新。