Page - 28 - in Water, Energy, and Environment - A Primer

water community rarely thought about the energy needed to provide water services. This may have worked well enough in the 20th century but will not work in the 21st as populations and demands for bothwater and energy continue to grow. Ifwe are to optimize our use of these essential resources we cannot treat water and energy issues as separate entities. Rather, we must create effective partnerships between those in government who have responsibility for water and energy security. This new understanding also suggests a related research agenda that requires government andprivate sector support: • Reducing the energy requirements of desalination • Developing improved technologies for water treatment and reuse • Reducing thewater requirements of agriculture • Reducing thewater requirements of thermal power plants • Understanding the impact of global warming and climate change on spatial and temporal variability of water resources • R&D to understand the water requirements of emerging energy technologies (to be discussed in succeeding chapters: ○ biofuels frombiomass ○ oil andnatural gas from frackingof shale deposits ○ oil extracted from tar sands ○ carbon capture and sequestration ○ concentrating solar power ○ the hydrogen economy. Theconundrumpresents seriouschallenges, butmanypromising options to address these challenges exist. Water,Energy, andEnvironment–APrimer28