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The century of water We have left the century of oil and entered the century of water. —Peter Anin, The GreatLakes Wares Wars Make no mistake. about it: There are both current and looming freshwater crises internationally and in the U.S., and they are being exacerbated:bypopulation:growth and climate change. According to the. United Nations: Approxirnateiy.4 billion people, representing nea rly two-th irds of the world's population, experience severe water scarcity during at least one month -of the year,. • A third of the worid's biggest groundwater -systems are already in distress, .. By 2030,;an estimated 700 million people.worldwide.could be displaced by:intense.water scarcity. o By 2040, one in four of the world's children .under 18—same 500 million in.aii—will be living in areas of extremely high water: stress.5 The United States is also running out of fresh .water. According to a 2019 federally funded report,in the. science journal.Earth's Future,. of the.2.04 water basins that.supplyrenewable fresh water6 to most of the country, over one-third may be unable to meetmonthly demand within the. next 25.years; a proportion thatgrows:to almost half by 2071.7 This. projected shortage, which takes into account cu rre nt trends toward lowering per -capita water usage, will. be driven by two principal factors. The first. is population growth:. The number of people in the. U.S.. is expected to rise from 308 million people in 2010 to 514 million in 2100,8 and this will naturally increase demand for fresh water. The second factor driving watershortage is climate change. While the predicted impacts from. climate change on water supply are complicated -for example; water losses in some areas from drought and increased temperature/evaporation must be balanced against water gains. in other areas from greater precipitation — the Earth's Future report e..stimates. that overall, there will he a:decrease in the freshwater supply because of climate change. Changes in water supply.wilI vary widely in different regions. For example, whereas some water basins in the Northwest, the Great. Basin,9. and California are. expected to see increased water yield10 over the next 50 years, a. majority of basins will experience decreases, with .particularly severe decreases in.the Southwest; the.: mlddIe to southern Great Plains,.and Flo rida..11 within a few decades, as a result, many regions of .the country may see their water.5upplies reduced by a third as. the demand for those dwindling supplies continues to. grow.12 Even this summer, the surging impacts of population growth and climate change have been.on full display in the: Western half of the U.S., which has been inthe grips of historicallysevere drought.13 New Mexico farmers along the Rio .Graride have been asked not to plant 'this year; Narth Dakota ranchers are trucking water and feed for livestock .because .their rangelands are so dry; low levels in the Lake.Mead R.ese.rvoir on the. Colorado River are likely to load to cutbacks in Arizona, Nevada, and other states; and California freshwater reservoirs contain only half as much water as usual for this time. of year. These impacts, scientists:say,.are made worse by climate change. The Earths Future report also evaluated potential avenues for mitigating this emerging water crisis..ln most water basins, for instance, agricultural irrigation constitutes over 75 percent of annual consumption.34 Reducing the water used far irrigation could free up water resources to ease critical impacts on high ermva I Ued water users, such as those in the municipal, industrial, and energy sectors. While: a 2 percent reduction in agricultural irrigation could make up the projected water shortfall lri some basins,..in. other basins —such as the Southwest and the:. central and southern Great Plains -the :reduction .wou.ld need.to be 30 percent.15 Achieving such a reduction in the nation's "bread basket' without raising serious concerns aboutfood security would be a daunting task indeed.