Tag: Chile

California seems like a big place to me – I live here.  However, to cover the land surface of earth would take 400 Californias.  There are other places of interest on this celestial ball, like Chile.  What’s amazing about Chile?  The following information comes from various sources and I have not fact-checked it all:

• 1/3 of all the copper in the world is mined here.
• Easter Island and its amazing, huge head statues are part of the country.
• It is a very secure country for residents and tourists.
• It’s in the Southern Hemisphere (I hope that wasn’t a surprise!)
• The world’s smallest deer, the pudú, is from there.
• The people are extraordinarily friendly to visitors.
• It has the driest “non-polar” desert in the world.  Drier than Death Valley in California??  Yup, it is:  The Atacama Desert in Chile gets 1/25 (0.04″) of an inch of rain per YEAR on average.

It is that last fact, about the Atacama Desert, that makes an amazing story about water rights.  Amazing to me, and hopefully to you, too.

Map of Chile

In March of 2015, there were very unusual, heavy rains in the desert, and sadly, over 100 people were killed.  Several cities were hit with floods, including the place of interest for this post, the City of Copiapó.

Atacama Desert, by Evelyn Pfeiffer

The ongoing, increasing problem is not floods, but lack of water.  Of course generations of Chileans have learned to live with that so they have water year-round.  However, recent increases in copper mining have required proportional increases in the use of water as part of the mining process.  (My mining expert friend Mark can correct me here if needed).

Ironically, in 1981, Augusto Pinochet, the formidable dictator, changed the water code so the government has much LESS control, so water rights are much more free market.  Not only can mining companies pay much more, up to $750,000 per acre-foot according to Copiapó city officials, but they can use water than runs on their own properties for free.  [An acre-foot is 43,560 cubic feet of water, or 325,851 gallons – 326,000 gallons near enough, and the amount used by 1 or 2 families per year.]  Given that mining companies have bought a significant chunk of farm land with water rights, that gives the companies the lion’s share.  The increased pumping and new city wells are pulling in more brackish or salty water, at the same time that there is much less water available.

City of Copiapó, Chile

In California, city residents might pay up to $4,000 per acre-foot of water, roughly speaking.  I know I’ll get corrected by more than a few people on that.  The highest-profit agriculture might pay up to $1,500 per acre-foot of water.  San Diego’s desalination plant that is being built right now, is expected to cost residents maybe $1,200 per acre-foot of use.

Thankfully, our State’s founders wrote us a good Constitution; it specifies that all water must be used reasonably and beneficially.  Human health and safety are the highest priorities.  Somehow, some way, water gets to 99.99% of people even in a severe drought.  In addition, California is one of the great breadbaskets of the world, even in a severe drought.  Folks, we are blessed in the State of California!  Go see some of the rest of the world, and it will increase your appreciation of our abundance of water, and even thankfulness for our confusing, multi-basis, and to some people “oudated”, water rights system in California.

Dunes of the Atacama, by Evelyn Pfeiffer

The photo above could be of the Anzo-Borrego desert in southeastern California, but it’s from the whole lot drier Atacama Desert in Chile.