water wars

The BBC is reporting that, due to drought, one of Australia's states is being forced to recycle waste water. The article also surprised me with this tidbit: "Water is already recycled in places like Singapore and the UK, but the idea is still unpopular in Australia." I had no idea this was already happening.

Of course, for what seems like forever, people have talked about the fact that water would be the next commodity to spark wars and the like, but I'd not really noticed as myth was creeping up on reality.

That's gonna suck. We use reclaimed water here for irrigation, at least according to the highway signs. I'd think they could use the reclaimed water for irrigation and other non-potable uses and save the good water for drinking. And I know it's uber-expensive, but I'd be working overtime on figuring out an effective, economically viable desalinization method. Also, I think I did know that England uses reclaimed water at least some of the time. I seem to remember an article about how medications (the pill was an example) don't always get filtered out and that there are cows with conveniently regulated menstruation or something like that.