Corpus Christi Sold Its Water to Exxon, Gambling on Desalination. So Far, It’s Losing the Bet

Via Inside Climate News, a report on how concerns over ecological destruction have delayed desalination plans for years in this booming seaside city, where environmentalists see water supply as the “chokehold” on an oil sector buildout along the rugged Gulf Coast of South Texas: Five years ago, when ExxonMobil came calling, city officials eagerly signed over a […]

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India’s Push for 24/7 Clean Energy From Dams Upends Lives

Via The Diplomat, commentary on India’s dam-building spree in pursuit of hydropower which has led to the displacement of people, deforestation and disasters in the Himalayan region: The pickup truck jostled away from the roaring Sutlej River and up the steep mountain path flanked by snow-capped Himalayan peaks, some nearly 7,000 meters (22,965 feet) high. The […]

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Are Floating Solar Panels the Future of Clean Energy Production?

Via Smithsonian Magazine, a look at the potential for “floatovoltaics” to drastically raise power generation and conserve water in reservoirs, according to a new study: Floating solar panels placed on reservoirs around the world could generate enough energy to power thousands of cities, according to a study published last week in the journal Nature Sustainability. Called floating […]

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Inside the Global Race to Turn Water Into Fuel

Courtesy of The New York Times, a report on the hydrogen industry, a sector into which hundreds of billions of dollars are being invested in a high-tech gamble to make hydrogen clean, cheap and widely available: For eons this has been a quiet, unremarkable place. Thousands of square miles of flat land covered in shrubs […]

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Fracking Waste Threatens Aquifers in West Texas

Via Inside Climate News, a report on the impact that fracking waste is having upon aquifers in west Texas: A fracked well in West Texas can produce five times as much wastewater as oil. Every day, fleets of tanker trucks haul hundreds of millions of gallons of this toxic brine to loosely regulated disposal facilities that line the rural […]

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California Pilot Tests Energy Storage on Solar Canal Canopies

Via PowerEngineering International, a report on California’s efforts to pilot test energy storage on solar canal canopies which has several interesting watergy attributes such as the water in the conveyance infrastructure has the potential to cool the solar panels, increasing their efficiency, while the solar panels also provide shade and wind protection over the water, reducing evaporation and […]

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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.”