[OKC] New book calls for an American water ethic

[Shauna Struby]

New book calls for an American water ethic

Blue Revolution:  Unmaking America's Water Crisis

 

Publication date:  September 20, 2011

Beacon Press

296 pages  *  Hardcover  *  Cover price $26.95

In Blue Revolution, Cynthia Barnett reports on the many ways one of the most
water-rich nations has squandered its way to scarcity, and argues the most
important solution is also the simplest and least expensive: a water ethic
for America.

>From backyard grottoes in one of the most green-credentialed cities in
California to sinkholes swallowing chunks of Florida, Blue Revolution
exposes the extent to which the nation's green craze missed water - the No.
1 environmental concern of most Americans, according to Gallup.

The book combines investigative reporting with solutions from around the
globe to show how local communities and entire nations have come together to
stretch vanishing water supplies and protect themselves from increasingly
devastating floods. In Singapore, Barnett writes about how an island nation
with too little water evolved an ethic that recycles every single drop. From
the Netherlands, she shows how the calamitous North Sea Flood of 1953 forced
the nation to overcome divisions and make water the national common cause.

Blue Revolution challenges the conventional wisdom that the United States
can build its way out of water crisis. To the contrary, the impacts of
climate change - almost all water-related - mean floodwaters such as those
from last month's Hurricane Irene need more natural outlets. Meanwhile as
new parts of the nation deal with devastating drought, Barnett argues that
no solution would be more powerful than an ethic for water - embraced not
only by citizens, but by government and major water users including the
energy and agricultural sectors.

The first book to call for a national water ethic, Blue Revolution is also a
powerful meditation on water and community in America. In addition to
discussing the water ethic, Barnett is available for interviews or op-eds
on:

* How a politically powerful "water-industrial complex" tends to steer
elected officials and policymakers toward the costliest water solutions -
not necessarily the best ones.

* How a turn toward "local water" holds some of the same advantages for
sustainability as the current embrace of local farmers and local produce.

* The extent to which Americans have lost their historically close
connection to water. More than two-thirds of Americans cannot identify the
source of their home water supply, so they don't necessarily connect an
ailing local river or spring to their own water use.

Barnett is also the author of Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the
Eastern U.S., an early warning of the spread of water scarcity from the arid
West to the wet East. She is a long-time newspaper and magazine journalist
whose awards include a national Sigma Delta Chi prize for investigative
magazine reporting; a gold medal for best nonfiction in the Florida book
awards; and eight Green Eyeshades, which recognize outstanding journalism in
the Southeast. 

Publicist Caitlin Meyer, Beacon Press,  <mailto:cmeyer at beacon.org>
cmeyer at beacon.org, 617-948-6584 

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