Southern Water, Southern Power: How the Politics of Cheap Energy and Water Scarcity Shaped a Region

Southern Water, Southern Power: How the Politics of Cheap Energy and Water Scarcity Shaped a Region
ISBN-10
1469620065
ISBN-13
9781469620060
Category
Nature
Pages
320
Language
English
Published
2015-04-06
Publisher
UNC Press Books
Author
Christopher J. Manganiello

Description

Why has the American South--a place with abundant rainfall--become embroiled in intrastate wars over water? Why did unpredictable flooding come to characterize southern waterways, and how did a region that seemed so rich in this all-important resource become derailed by drought and the regional squabbling that has tormented the arid American West? To answer these questions, policy expert and historian Christopher Manganiello moves beyond the well-known accounts of flooding in the Mississippi Valley and irrigation in the West to reveal the contested history of southern water. From the New South to the Sun Belt eras, private corporations, public utilities, and political actors made a region-defining trade-off: The South would have cheap energy, but it would be accompanied by persistent water insecurity. Manganiello's compelling environmental history recounts stories of the people and institutions that shaped this exchange and reveals how the use of water and power in the South has been challenged by competition, customers, constituents, and above all, nature itself.

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