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Nayelli Gonzalez

Nayelli is a native Californian and believer in the spirit of the West.

She was raised in Southern California and briefly left the state to major in journalism and history at Boston University, only to return to complete a master's in American History at UC Berkeley and a master's in Education at Stanford University. For two years thereafter, she taught world history at a charter high school in San Francisco and now works at an environmental law firm in the city, where she learns about California water issues everyday and has made changes to gain the firm a "green business" certification. Nayelli plans to transition into Sustainability Consulting and apply her passion for enacting social and environmental change within the business world.

As a GreenOptions writer, her writing focuses on the social, political and environmental implications of the diminishing amount of freshwater in California and around the globe. She wonders what governments, businesses and organizations around the world are doing about the global water crisis.

Toxins have been found in China's rivers; Spain and Egypt (to name a few nations) are running out of water as their populations grow; and in Darfur people are fighting over clean water. Where is this all leading us? Nayelli is passionate about these issues, and hopefully you will be too.

EcoLocalizer

Will Sacramento be the next New Orleans? - California Prepares with Levees and Flood Insurance

In 2005 the world was aghast by the images seen on television and newspapers of the mass destruction caused to human life and the city of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina.

A recent report reveals that State authorities are bolstering levees around Sacramento to prevent it from experiencing Katrina-like effects during a flood. They also hope that severe storms don’t hit the capital city before the completion of projects planned to end by 2012.

With […]

Red, Green, and Blue

Peripheral Canal Bill a No Go - Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Canal Shot Down by California State Assembly

A California State Assembly committee last week declined to entertain a controversial bill set to build a canal around the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and shelved it until next year.

Senator Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, has worked on gaining approval from various parties for Senate Bill 27 for two years. Ultimately, farmers, environmentalists and Delta locals opposed the proposed legislation and may have convinced the assembly committee to reject the bill as is.

Often viewed as a new permutation of the 1980 “Peripheral Canal” bill, which proposed the construction of a Delta water-transfer facility and was viewed by many as threat to the local environment, SB 27 has been controversial from its inception.

EcoWorldly

Great Lakes, Great Wars? - Future of Great Lakes Water Rights

Spurred by shrinking freshwater supplies, U.S. states could begin “water wars” in the next years to claim rights to Great Lakes water, warned American and Canadian scientists at a water conference in Toronto last week.

Nations around the world, such as India and Australia, are already experiencing drought and its effects on access to clean water and increases in food prices–and states in the American South and West are bracing themselves for a […]

Sustainablog

“Show Me the Water”

Speakers at a water conference in San Francisco today discussed the relationship between development and water supplies. Or, more to the point, the lack of water and continued urban sprawl in much of California and other western states.

The talk given by Roger Moore and David Boyer entitled, “The Water Supply and Land Use Interface: Lessons from a Decade of Litigation under the UWMPA, CEQA, and SB 610/221″ was part of the 2008 California Water Law & Policy Conference organized by Argent Communications Group.

Moore and Boyer, both environmental lawyers, shared their perspectives on California’s Urban Water Management Planning Act, the California Environmental Quality Act, and Senate Bills 610 and 221–often called the “show me the water” laws.

EcoWorldly

No Water Means No Food

Announcements by the United Nations World Food Program and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change made this week linked climate change and drought to shortages in food, and warned that lack of fresh water could lead to a global food crisis.

In a report presented in Budapest on Thursday, scientists from the IPCC reported that the decline in the quantity and quality of water would affect health and agriculture in arid areas around the world.

The Western United States, Mediterranean Sea basin, and parts of Southern Africa and northeastern Brazil were singled out as places where drought could lead to less water for farming, and hence food shortages.

The UN World Food Program also reported yesterday that drought in Australia has slowed down the nation’s grain harvest, which has raised wheat prices and has diminished the amount of this food source for the WFP. The WFP has traditionally used Australian wheat to feed 80 million of the world’s hungry.

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