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One Man is Solving Texas' Drought Woes by Capturing Cloud Juice

It's easy to forget when you cruising through the sprawling metropolises of the Southwest -- Dallas, Phoenix, even Los Angeles -- that the region is largely desert, and arid at the least. Securing water's long been a contentious issue in those parts...

It’s easy to forget when you cruising through the sprawling metropolises of the Southwest — Dallas, Phoenix, even Los Angeles — that the region is largely desert, and arid at the least. Securing water’s long been a contentious issue in those parts, but now it’s getting downright worrisome. That fact has come to a head in rural Texas, where drought has forced already-water thrifty folk to cut consumption by as much as 80 percent. The kicker? They’re still running dry.

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PBS has a great report focusing on a pair of small Texas towns struggling to secure water. It’s a part of a series on dealing with climate change, and it’s worth a hard look inward for those who think that wonky weather caused by global warming isn’t going to mean much. From the piece:

[The town of] Robert Lee isn't alone. To conserve what little water is left, the state of Texas restricted water use in 1,000 cities and towns last year. Of those, 17 are considered critical — in danger of running out of water in six months or less. Topping that list is the town of Spicewood Beach, a community of 500 homes on the shores of Lake Travis near Austin. Spicewood relies on wells fed by water from both the lake and the aquifer below the town. Too much water use and too little rainfall last year caused the water table to sink to historic lows. This January, Spicewood Beach became the first Texas town to run out of water. Now, a 7,000-gallon water truck arrives in Spicewood Beach each day to supply the homes.

Of course, driving in water from elsewhere isn’t particularly sustainable. Richard Heinichen, a “cloud juice” lover in the dusty, optimistically-named town of Dripping Springs, has the answer: Catch and store as much rainwater as possible. As he points out in the segment above, it’s a heck of a lot easier — and cleaner — to trap water in the air, rather than waiting for it to seep down to a well. Heinichen is now the self-proclaimed mayor of Tank Town, his rain-capture supply store. With his arsenal of tanks and rain-capture systems, he’s running a booming business bringing the promise of water security to thirsty Texas.

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