Four thousand acres of private land in the Mojave desert are slated to become the site of an ambitious new concentrating solar power (CSP) plant: Hualapai Valley Solar (HVS). Named one of the Top 100 US Strategic Infrastructure Projects by CG/LA Infrastructure LLC, HVS is expected to produce 340MW of electricity, provide hundreds of new jobs and attract new business to the local area.There’s only one problem — water.

HVS will consume an estimated 800 million gallons of water each year, placing significant pressure on the local aquifer. According to an article in the Kingman Daily Miner: Read more

This week we continue counting down the 19 best solutions to the global freshwater crisis captured by a GlobeScan and SustainAbility poll of more than 1200 leading international experts in 80 countries. Here’s the final list.

Virtually every industry in the world anticipates sweeping systemic transformation over the next decade in their strategic planning, production practices, and business models, according to the Sustainability Survey Poll on Water. The global opinion poll, which released a survey of more than 1,200 sustainability experts in March, concludes that water shortages will shift public perception of the value of water, prompting governments and companies to view clean water not as a commodity to exploit but as a precious resource. Read more

Though liquid fuels derived from plants have the potential to shift energy production to much cleaner products and practices, to date the environmental benefits do not yet surpass the risks, according to a number of influential studies including a 2009 United Nations report.

Students at the University of Michigan are working to create algae-based water treatment and bio-energy systems, like this photobioreactor shown above. As the algae grows and takes up nutrients from its surroundings, it accumulates lipids that are later converted into biodiesel.

That tilt may soon be righted by researchers at the University of Virginia and the Seawater Foundation, who discovered that the most important source of the risk-benefit imbalance was the heavy reliance on fresh water and the need for petroleum-based fertilizer to improve plant productivity. Researchers at both organizations substituted wastewater rich in organic material and developed much cleaner and efficient practices for biofuels development. Read more

How much drinkable water is there in the world? How much water does an American, a European, an African use everyday? How many people lack even basic access to clean water? Circle of Blue’s newest infographic aims to answer these questions and many more.

With 6,000 children dying every day (water fact #7) from preventable water related diseases, readily accessible and easily understood information is vital to solving the world water crisis. Circle of Blue strives to identify and describe the dimensions of the global freshwater crisis in ways not imagined only a few years ago. Print these graphics and post them in your classrooms, offices, homes, or whereever you think people should know more about water. Read more

Jan G. Davidsen and his graduate students are spies. They use listening stations and special tags they attach to their subjects to track their movements. They follow their subjects winter and summer, day and night. They are in pursuit of secrets. And they are relentless.

Master’s student Anne Cathrine Flaten (left) and researcher Jan Davidsen from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology remove a listening device from Snillfjord in central Norway so they can download data on the movements of sea trout in the fjord.

Fortunately, this is not the Stasi, nor the KGB. Davidsen is a biologist at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology’s University Museum, and his subjects are 15 cm long slivers of silvery sea trout. Read more