Archive for July, 2017

Down the Mighty Columbia River, A Power Struggle Looms

Courtesy of The New York Times, an interesting look at the Trump administration’s proposal to sell off portions of a vast system that produces nearly half of the nation’s hydropower electricity: To ride down the Columbia River as the John Day Dam’s wall of concrete slowly fills the view from a tugboat is to see […]

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How Water Shortages Cost India Enough Energy to Power Sri Lanka

Via World Resources Institute, an article on how water shortages affect India’s power generation potential: India is making great strides to aggressively expand its renewable energy capacity. But the country’s power sector remains highly reliant on thermoelectric plants, with high demand for water for cooling. That means that droughts, like the one caused last year by weak […]

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A Limiting Factor On Electricity Production In A Warming World? Water.

Via Ars Technica, a report on the watergy nexus in the European Union: Unless you work at a coal, gas, or nuclear plant, you may not think about water when you think about electricity (certainly at a household level; they don’t mix). But water plays an important part in cooling many power plants, and many power […]

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How Can Cities Reduce Watergy Pressure?

Via the World Bank’s Water Blog, interesting commentary from Robert Brears on how cities around the world are exploring a variety of technological and management innovations to reduce urban water-energy nexus pressures Cities over the past century have become the driving force of the global economy. Accounting for over half the world’s population and generating around 80% of […]

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No Water, No Power

Via the World Resources Institute, an article on the watergy nexus: Drought in Kenya and neighboring countries became so severe earlier this year that the government of Kenya declared a national disaster. Already, the effects have been devastating: Food production dropped, leaving more than 2.6 million people without access to sufficient food. Some villagers have […]

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About This Blog And Its Author
As the scarcity of water and energy continues to grow, the linkage between these two critical resources will become more defined and even more acute in the months ahead.  This blog is committed to analyzing and referencing articles, reports, and interviews that can help unlock the nascent, complex and expanding linkages between water and energy -- The Watergy Nexus -- and will endeavor to provide a central clearinghouse for insightful articles and comments for all to consider.

Educated at Yale University (Bachelor of Arts - History) and Harvard (Master in Public Policy - International Development), Monty Simus has held a lifelong interest in environmental and conservation issues, primarily as they relate to freshwater scarcity, renewable energy, and national park policy.  Working from a water-scarce base in Las Vegas with his wife and son, he is the founder of Water Politics, an organization dedicated to the identification and analysis of geopolitical water issues arising from the world’s growing and vast water deficits, and is also a co-founder of SmartMarkets, an eco-preneurial venture that applies web 2.0 technology and online social networking innovations to motivate energy & water conservation.  He previously worked for an independent power producer in Central Asia; co-authored an article appearing in the Summer 2010 issue of the Tulane Environmental Law Journal, titled: “The Water Ethic: The Inexorable Birth Of A Certain Alienable Right”; and authored an article appearing in the inaugural issue of Johns Hopkins University's Global Water Magazine in July 2010 titled: “H2Own: The Water Ethic and an Equitable Market for the Exchange of Individual Water Efficiency Credits.”