California Drought

California is experiencing the worst drought in its history, and the effects are being felt nationwide. Thus water issues have taken center stage in much of our reporting and the nation's.As the New York Times says, "Water has long been a precious resource in California, the subject of battles pitting farmer against city-dweller and northern communities against southern ones; books and movies have been made about its scarcity and plunder. Water is central to the state’s identity and economy, and a symbol of how wealth and ingenuity have tamed nature ..."As we continue through a fourth year of extreme drought conditions, you'll find all of our reporting on the related issues (and that of NPR and other member stations) in this centralized place.

Not All Almonds Are Equal When It Comes To Water Use

Published April 15, 2015 at 10:24 AM PDT

The agriculture industry in California accounts for 80 percent of the state’s total water use, so when Governor Jerry Brown’s recent mandatory water restrictions didn’t include farmers, he got a lot of flak.

No one disputes that growing crops is very water intensive, but when some media outlets, including Mother Jones and the the Los Angeles Times, published charts and reports on how much water it takes to grow various crops, it drew additional attention to farming’s use of water.

A number of farmers Here & Now spoke with refute these reports, including the widely posted claim that it takes 1.1 gallons of water to grow one almond. We decided to turn to Joshua Viers, an ecological engineer and water resource management expert, to see what he had to say on the matter.

Viers told host Jeremy Hobson that how much water almonds use is complex and dependent on topography, geography, soil nutrients and irrigation.

Guest

Joshua Viers, ecological engineer and director of CITRIS at the University of California, Merced. He’s also the new director of University of California Water Security and Sustainability Research Initiative.