An article on Alter.Net provides a useful overview of how shifts in precipitation and other climate patterns will continue to have major disruptive effects on the availability of fresh water in the United States. The short version is that the gradual movement of the jet stream farther north will make the southern states — both eastern and western — drier in future years. If, like me, you’re thinking, “Hmmm. Time to buy that vacation spot up north,” that may not be an easy solution either. For one, there are likely to be more violent storms, including frequent major flooding, in the northern tier states. Also, an article in Wired’s pseudo-anti-environmental June 2008 issue points out two actions that could contribute to mitigating environmental catastrophe are

• live in a hot climate and use air conditioning, rather than live in a cold place and use heating (A/C is more efficient and otherwise cleaner than heating)
• live in a city, because cities are inherently more efficient than more dispersed settlements

What to do? (By the way, be sure to actually read Wired’s articles rather than accept its hyperbolic cover and titles at face value. And read the counterpoint article.) Perhaps these trends together point toward living in hot places (best get used to it) and piping in lots of water from up north. I suspect that major water redistribution projects, far exceeding the number and scale of those the American Southwest has known for years, are going to become the next generation’s equivalent of the Interstate Highway projects of the 1960s and 1970s (not to mention the need to also replace the interstate highways and other crumbling national infrastructures, or — should we suffer an infectious case of rationality — we could actually invest in real interstate rapid transit systems).