The following article was originally written for The Austin Playboys in November 2015. This article includes some of my behind-the-scenes analysis that I didn't include in the article at the time.

"If there's three things Texas will never have enough of they are oil, water and good weather." (My Aunt O. Smith)

When Water Feels Abundant

Within the first month after I moved back to Texas, it rained at least ten inches and that amount covered 66% of the rain that the area received annually. Yet, after the rain, Texans kept saying that they had experienced a drought for the last ten years. With this abundance of the water, I began to see bizarre behavior in the city of Lubbock.

They shot the water in the air, to make it evaporate so they had more space parking.

They watered their lawns more frequently, even though grass in Lubbock doesn’t need much water.

They over used water on crops, even though some of the crops perform better during droughts.

As Texas continues to experience on-and-off droughts, I think we should discuss how Texas can solve its drought problem. We all benefit from this because reliable water opens the door to significant economic innovation. In addition, many people say that "Water is the oil of the 21rst century" and I think we should stay ahead in this area.

We can’t always control water abundance, especially after a dry period. But we should be aware that these periods of abundance do not last forever. Retaining some of these resources, when we have them in high volumes, is a good idea.

A few approaches that could save these resources when we need them: build and enhance existing communities with effective retainers for water, such as canals, under ground water tanks, created (or enhanced) lakes and rivers, etc, encourage and reward businesses and individuals who work with other businesses that need water to help migrate water from wet areas to dry areas, or which retain water for later use, and incentivize businesses to export water to other areas outside of the state during wet years. The latter idea, relative to the ratio of flood-to-drought years, may not be as applicable if the ratio is below 0.5.

When water seems plentiful, businesses and individuals use more than enough, or engage in waste of water if it intrudes in their affairs. It may seem like a good idea to blast water into the air, when we have more than enough, because we have to fill parking spaces, yet this very approach may end up costing the same business in the long run when they need water.

A more conservative solution would be to contact businesses that could extract the water to their benefit for free and allow them to use it, which then returns these resources back to the economy. In the long run, this approach also opens the door for businesses using and needing water to optimize solutions that will extract the water faster benefiting both their business and the other business (or individual) needing the water removed.

On an individual note, I've found two techniques work extremely well for preserving water during abundance and scarcity. The first involves adding at least one water container near the roof where water run-off from gutters can rest. This container can then be used to water plants, rather than using water from the city. The other approach that saves significant water involves using wood chips at the base of crops or in soil where we want to retain water (often for growth). In doing estimates of water preservation, I've found that wood chips can save up to 70% water use in some situations.

These two techniques work in situations where water is abundant or rare. In fact, woodchips often mean that during abundant water seasons, I don't need to water crops at all. Likewise, storing extra water during abundance provides water during seasons where water is rare.

When Water Feels Rare

What about the opposite situation – when water is rare? Why do we wait until the last minute to finally begin limiting and practicing good water use? This is as asinine as trying to save money after a job loss.

During years of plenty, we tend to think that years of plenty will always be around (they won’t) and it’s easy to over use resources. Yet self-discipline during good times is just as important as perseverance during bad times. What doesn’t come easy in both the good and bad times is what we should be doing. Even if we’ve had floods of rain, we should still restrict how much we water lawns, at what time we’re watering lawns, and using tools and equipment that preserve water.

For individual farmers, or those living in communities, I've noted some helpful suggestions that I've used in my own orchard applications. One of them that I mention above is to use containers to store extra water, or create a small landfill designed for water retention. Between trees, this can be a miniature canal. Or with trees that may require seasons of water as well as seasons without, storage containers placed to collect and retain water.

Another technique I use involves mounds and rows of land to retain water and soak crops in water, relative to the crop. Remember that some crops, like grapes, thrive in agricultural environments with less water.

Finally, work and barter with other farms if you are able to store more water than you can use (or vice versa). Nothing beats the exchange of necessary resources without overhead costs. In these cases, your extra water, for instance, may be worth your neighbor’s extra fertilizer and both of you can enhance what you produce. This applies to communities as well.

Storage containers for water might be expensive, depending on the economic cycle, but these also fall drastically in price in some periods, especially when farmers move and want to get rid of some of their equipment. In both of these cases, you can use these containers at a significant cost reduction. A temporary solution is a well irrigated miniature lake.

For medium to large size businesses, we have to consider scaling some of these solutions as well as bigger solutions. Relative to the water cost on your bottom line, in years where water is in abundance, set aside the amount that you need during those years for future years. Use that savings to increase the company’s ability to store and retain water.

For dry areas prone to spurts of droughts and fewer wet seasons, consider investing in or working with desalination companies. One environmental myth is that these don’t produce much fresh water; one company, Salttech, shared with me that they can produce as much as 95% fresh water (along with retaining the extra minerals) during their desalination process. It is not the only company that can do this and we should expect to see more companies in the future that can. If they’re in your area, have your company use their resources to obtain water for those dry years.

Invest some of your resources in water containers to be able to increase your storage of water. Unlike individuals, you should focus on mass storage, which you will generally obtain for much less costs. For businesses on top of aquifers, research effective methods for re-filling aquifers (yes, man made solutions exist) that reduce the amount of water that evaporates or is lost.

Practice conservation with your company by reducing unnecessary water use. Techniques as simple as using wood chips, timing when you water, or completely ceasing some activities due to water abundance can save significant resources during the years of famine.

Long Term Solutions

To meet its long term needs, Texas will require desalination plants by the coast. One of my favorite observations about living in Texas is how everyone is convinced that we’re an oil state, when we’re actually one of the top states in green energy (and yes, we have a lot of oil too).

Texas is a pragmatic state: when Greece experienced a crisis recently and people were worried that we might face an olive shortage, some farmers in my area decided that they would start olive farms and try to make Texas the second leading producer of olives in the world. This is one of many reasons I absolutely love Texas – if there is a global problem in [x], Texans will try to solve it, even if the problem is beyond their capability. This is one, of many reasons, that the industrial make up of the state looks much different than it did in the 1980s.

In addition, Texas could scale its desalination plants as needed by generating fresh water every year, but more in years when needed. But there is a trick here that we can easily forget - energy. Desalination is energy intense and in my view, Texans have become lazy in energy because we think it's abundant. Nothing is ever abundant and no one with an exceptional mentality thinks or lives by abundance, rather they live by urgency.

Texans must first get in front of the desalination problem by expanding its current energy ability. The last time I investigated energy, I noticed that Texas had capacity for at least two more nuclear reactors. Given that nuclear energy is extremely unpopular right now (but also extremely cheap), this would make a good time to expand our nuclear energy capacity. Remember that low prices often solve themselves; people abandon the industry. Yet this is precisely the time we should be expanding nuclear energy because it's cheap. It also gives us options and as a professor once told me, "Energy is the currency of humanity" (there will never be an energy rich poor country).

(Unrelated to this article about water, I like to remind Texans that we want to be energy diverse. In addition, we want energy skill. What people forget is that you can't magically turn on skill; if nuclear energy is needed in the future, you then have to wait periods of time to train talent. By being energy diverse, we train and keep talent in a wide variety of energy industries and this means that we can use the most efficient energy, plus have people who know how to maximize these energy sources. I realize this seems boring, but this type of strategic action pays dividends that is a higher standard of living we forget to appreciate. Let's avoid being the state that relies on one or two sources of energy or faces limits due to untrained talent.)

According to some of my own calculations, the average Texan uses about 120 gallons of water per day. With a population close to 25 million, that's equates to over 3 billion gallons of water used daily. The cold hard truth is that we need the capacity to produce enough water daily during the dry years to offset the loss of water. In other words, we don't want to prepare our desalination capacity for the abundant years, but dry years. This requires more details than I have at this time, but in speaking with a few people in the water community, a capacity of at least 300 million gallons of water per day would be a good starting point (10% of the daily need).

Finally, building desalination plants doesn’t only create jobs, it creates long term jobs because both the plants and the pipelines to transport the water must be built. Once everything is built, they will also need energy (more jobs) in addition to opening up opportunities that may have not been available in dry areas, such as agriculture. In other words, the same worker who helps build the pipeline could someday start a farm that grows crops, which receives its water from that pipeline.

How Texas Can Solve Its Drought Problem