The Environmental Protection Agency just proposed to repeal critical protections for the drinking water of 117 million Americans. After tragedies like Flint, Mich., the toxic algal bloom in Ohio, and countless other tales of polluted waterways, it’s hard to overstate the importance of safe drinking water for all.

In 2015, the Clean Water Rule clarified the streams and rivers protected by the Clean Water Act, our bedrock clean water legislation. The rule also protects wetlands, which help filter out pollutants and provide wildlife habitat, as well as serve as buffers against the fiercest storms. Read more

The waterways of the West now exist as monuments to an ambitious desert civilization. Across this vast region of America, few, if any, rivers flow without hosting one or more dams, concrete channels, diversions or other human-made “improvements” that allow people and farming to flourish in this dry country. And few, if any, rivers reveal this unnatural world more than the Colorado, which no longer reaches the sea or carries along its entire 1,450-mile length much of the reddish silt that inspired its name.

Glen Canyon Dam on the Colorado River near Page, Ariz.

The prolific author and New Yorker contributor David Owen details what has happened to the river that once carved the Grand Canyon in his new book, a brisk and informative travelogue that wends from headwaters in the state of Colorado to where the water trickles to a halt in a riverbed cracked by the heat of the desert sun in Mexico. This is well-traveled territory, including Marc Reisner’s classic book from 1986, “Cadillac Desert,” which remains the definitive work on the West and its water woes. The problem then, as now, is people — and what we have chosen to do with the water. Read more

Shares of the Brazilian water utility Sabesp took a dip this week after it said it might raise new equity. Investors everywhere, however, will have to get used to such capital calls.

Citigroup estimates that water companies need to spend up to $10 trillion globally by 2029 on new and upgraded infrastructure.

It’s true that Sabesp, the world’s fourth-largest water and sanitation company, could have done a better job with communication. Its missive at the end of last week didn’t mention amounts or timing, and only when asked did executives say that nothing is likely to happen for at least a year.

Sabesp’s current ownership complicates matters, too. The State of São Paulo owns a 50.3 percent stake, and any recapitalization plan would have to keep the government in control. Investors registered their confusion by sending the stock down on Monday and on a roller-coaster ride the next two days. Read more

During the final exams of Spanish official high school of journalists, a student was asked by the panel of professors-examiners: If scientists discover that there is water in Planet Mars, how would you announce this news, what would be your title? The student did not hesitate a second: “There is life in Mars!” The student was graduated with the highest score.

In spite of this simple truth, human beings have been systematically wasting this primordial source of life. So much, that the United Nations has warmed ahead of this year’s World Water Day, marked on March 22, “We’re all wasters when it comes to wastewater.”

In fact, the world body reminds that every time “we use water, we produce wastewater. And instead of reusing it, we let 80 per cent of it just flow down the drain. We all need to reduce and reuse wastewater as much as we can. Here are three ideas for all us wasters!” Read more

For millions of people on the planet “desert” is a terrible word, a synonym for hunger, thirst and death. Huge areas lacking water, and hence life, just keep growing and growing, and until recent times nothing could be done about it. Our current Water-gallery presents projects that have challenged the drought, as well as people that turn dead lands into blooming oases in the most unusual ways.

1. Israeli agricultural miracle. No wonder the farmers of the Promised Land serve as an example to the whole world. And perhaps their most impressive achievement is the narrow valley Arava, between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea. It’s a giant vegetable garden, and the research institute in the same area. To begin with, there are almost no clouds over this desert – only the scorching sun and an average rainfall of 3 cm per year. And, nevertheless, 60% of all Israel agricultural products are grown here. Pepper, melons and even capricious grapes feel just fine here. The technology in which this is possible is called drip irrigation. The essence of the method is a strict dosage of water supplied by special drippers to the root of the plant. Water is taken directly from the sea, freshening with installations based on pure solar energy. Also in Israel, sprinkler systems simulating precipitation are successfully used. This allows to evenly saturating the soil with moisture, and at the desired depth. Read more