The October 18, 2010 edition of Newsweek includes an article by Jeneen Interlandi raising the question about whether private companies should control water resources.
Sitka, Alaska is a city of less than 10,000 people that spreads across 5,000 square miles and owns Blue Lake: trillions of gallons of water so pure that it needs no treatment.
The city will soon begin selling 80 million gallons of this water each year for bottling and shipping to cities throughout the Middle East.
The rights to another three billion gallons a year have been purchased for shipping by tanker to a water processing plant that will be built in India.
Water transfer is nothing new.
As far back as the Romans water was piped from mountains to cities.
What is different now is that the world is experiencing a global freshwater crisis.
Rivers, lakes and aquifers are dwindling.
The quality of this water is being compromised by industrial and household chemicals.
The world population is increasing to such a point that the United Nations predicts demand for freshwater will outstrip supply by more than 30 percent.
Goldman Sachs estimates that global water consumption is doubling every 20 years.
In the midst of this situation private ownership of water has become big business, as evidenced by Sitka.
Cities are looking to privatize water delivery because of the revenue it generates and because it relieves government of antiquated water delivery systems and other related headaches.
Water supply, distribution and cost are not the next great crisis.
They are the current great crisis, even though many of us do not notice it - yet.