Not a Drop to Drink: America's Water Crisis (and What You Can Do) [Paperback]

Ken Midkiff (Author), Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 28, 2007

In some parts of the United States, water is disappearing as consumption exceeds supply. In other parts, battles are raging that will determine both the cost and the quality of a simple glass of water. Not a Drop to Drink comprehensively examines the imminent crisis of America’s water supply and explains what readers everywhere can do about it. In this straightforward, story-driven book, Ken Midkiff talks to crusty ranchers in Topeka, suited lawyers in Atlanta, and smooth-talking politicians in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Using regional and national case studies, he analyzes and presents the roots of the problem, and then says what we must do to solve it. Written by one of the foremost experts on America's water supply, Not a Drop to Drink is a must-read book for concerned citizens nationwide.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Though it offers a litany of damning facts about America's state-of-emergency water crisis, this is pretty dry reading. Midkiff (The Meat You Eat) earnestly marshals plenty of cautionary information: once-flush aquifers are being rapidly depleted, most precipitously the Ogallala, which stretches from Nebraska to the Texas panhandle, while the Colorado (in Texas) and Rio Grande rivers vanish into dry riverbeds before they reach the Gulf of Mexico. Water from the tap in Atlanta has had to be boiled to make it potable, while farmers' wells in New Mexico are tapped out. Midkiff frets that the privatization of municipal water services will raise household bills for private profit, and faults outdated, lobby-driven farm subsidies for encouraging "water-guzzling" rice crops in California's Central Valley, which was once a desert, before the lure of underpriced water transformed it into an agricultural cornucopia. The author, former director of the Sierra Club's clean water campaign, doesn't put stock in desalinization plants or the meltwater of towed glaciers, believing that conservation is the most viable path to sustaining water supplies. His call for immediate collective effort makes good sense, even if expressed with bromides like "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." (Apr.)
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Review

“An insightful analysis of the oncoming water crisis, this book deserves attention from environmentalists and developers, as well as citizens concerned about both protecting and using our water resources.” — Bruce Babbitt, former governor of Arizona and secretary of the interior for the Clinton Administration “In the spirit of Marc Reisner’s classic Cadillac Desert, Ken Midkiff writes brilliantly of threats more certain than terrorist attacks and every bit as devastating. This book makes you think about what your children will drink.” — Bill Lambrecht, author of Dinner at the New Gene Café “Midkiff discusses how we can implement rational water policy in the West that services America’s citizens rather than the greedy powerful few and that creates an example for the democratic use of public trust resources worldwide.” — from the foreword by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. “At last there is a book that gives us the ‘nuts and bolts’ of rivers and water issues. Ken Midkiff’s compelling chapter on the Colorado and Rio Grande rivers is the most accurate description of the problems facing western water today.” — Richard Ingebretsen, MD, PhD, president, Glen Canyon Institute --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 212 pages
• Publisher: New World Library (June 28, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1930722680
• ISBN-13: 978-1930722682
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,327,962 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Book Review, May 14, 2009

By 

Whitney "Geography Girl" (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Not a Drop to Drink: America's Water Crisis (and What You Can Do) (Paperback)

I found Not a Drop to Drink to be a very interesting an informative book. If offered new facts in excess. While it was very easy to read, gave reference to geographers, and addressed the politics of water, the book lacked in several ways. I would have like to have seen more maps, diagrams, and tables to explain a lot of the information Midkiff presented. I also would have liked him to focus more on the action people could take to preserve water on a personal scale. Much of his "What You Can Do" portions of the book focused on contacting and working with government officials. The average American does not have time for such dedication but would like aid in smaller but significant ways. Overall, I think Midkiff wrote a fantastic book on the water crisis in America, but not for people uninterested in the politics behind that water.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The subject deserves a better book than this, January 20, 2008

By 

R. Young "Mensch-in-training" (East Bay, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Not a Drop to Drink: America's Water Crisis (and What You Can Do) (Paperback)

This is a thin, poorly edited book about a coming train wreck in water supply. I think it attempts to follow in the footsteps of the late Marc Reisner's "Cadillac Desert", a noble idea as that (far better) book was a history, and suggested no solutions. Midkoff, to his credit, does suggest some actions, and provides both a broader geographic scope (problems in the Southeast and Northeast) and more currency, but the pedestrian prose, and the narrowness of his research weigh this book down. His look at solutions focuses on desalination and moving icebergs, but ignores water recycling and other conservation methods.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars great overview, not so great solutions, December 10, 2010

By 

Erik - See all my reviews

This review is from: Not a Drop to Drink: America's Water Crisis (and What You Can Do) (Paperback)

Ken Midkiff analyses America's current and oncoming water crisis in Not a Drop to Drink. The author investigates the problems with how the U.S. gets and uses its freshwater. The author's main argument is that the U.S. uses too much freshwater. The current use of freshwater in the U.S. is unsustainable and our current use puts the needs of future generations at risk. A large amount of freshwater in the U.S. is used for the irrigation of water intensive crops in dry areas. The author shows that this is only economically viable because the government subsidizes water for this purpose. The author thinks it's wrong for the government to subsidize the depletion of our freshwater resources.

Aquifers are being depleted and the author goes into great detail about the Ogallala Aquifer. The author also investigates the current state of rivers in the western U.S. and the Colorado River and the Rio Grande River were evaluated in detail. Both of these rivers often go dry by the time they reach the Gulf of California and the Gulf of Mexico, respectively. Large cities in Arizona, California and Nevada continue to grow and fight for the water rights to these and other rivers. Wells in the southwestern U.S. frequently go dry due to the overuse and depletion of groundwater. The author also looks at the privatization of water companies. The author argues that water companies should always be owned by the government.

All in all, the book is an interesting read. The author does a great job of presenting the current issues but the proposed solutions are not great. Most of the author's solutions are over simplified political solutions.