Chapter 1
Historical Perspective of Water
Use and Development
Chapter Headings
•
•
•
•
Drinking Water for Early Civilizations
Early Irrigation and Flood-Control Projects
Early Water Transportation Development
Early Hydropower Development
What is Civilization?
• For civilization to emerge you need
– Agriculture
– Cities
– “Leisure time” to develop skilled workers
• Among the key features are
– Ability to manage water
– Suitable soil and climate for agriculture
Pacific Northwest Exception
Due to rich salmon runs
Managing Water Resources
• Even in the earliest civilizations we can
find evidence of water management
– Delivery of drinking water to cities using
qanats and aqueducts
– Routing of wastewater out of cities
– Delivery of water for agriculture through
irrigation
– Transportation
– Hydropower
Drinking Water for Early
Civilizations
• Earliest civilization centers emerged in:
– Mesopotamia along the Tigris and Euphrates
Rivers (Syria and Iraq)
– Indus River (Pakistan)
– Yangtze River (China)
– Nile River (Egypt)
– Greek and Roman empires (Mediterranean)
Figure 1.1
Qanats
• Qanat system developed in Mesopotamia
area
– From a Semitic word meaning “to dig”
– Semitic: subfamily of Afro-Asiatic language
family that includes Hebrew and Arabic
• Delivered ground water by gravity from an
upland area where it was plentiful to
lowland agricultural areas and cities
• Qanat shafts served 3
purposes
– Air supply
– Remove soil and rock
– Keep tunnels from being
too long
• http://www.livius.org/q/qa
nat/qanat.html
View down a shaft to water below
Outlet
Aerial photo showing collapsed shafts
Aqueducts
• Roman empire developed an extensive
system of aqueducts to deliver surface
water by gravity to cities
• Water was delivered to fountains and
baths where citizens collected and used it
• Allowed cities to grow in size
• Reduced amount of time that individuals
(usually women) spent obtaining daily
water
Women at a stream
collecting water to
carry to their village in
Cameroon
UNESCO
www.wateryear2003.org
Aqueduct in Segovia, Spain
Roman
public
fountain
Water and wastewater systems in Imperial Rome, WaterHistory.org
Water and wastewater systems in Imperial Rome, WaterHistory.org
Roman public bath at Pompei, Italy
Water and wastewater systems in Imperial Rome, WaterHistory.org
Water and wastewater systems in Imperial Rome, WaterHistory.org
Cloaca Maxima (main
sewer) for ancient Rome
http://courses.washington.ed
u/tande/urb/
Cloaca Maxima today, Wikipedia
Wind Gap Pumping Plant, Tehachapi Range north of LA
California Aqueduct
Drinking Water Today
• Supplying water and removing wastewater
is still an important function today
• Many problems
– Water quality (bacteria, carcinogens, heavy
metals, nutrients etc.)
– Water quantity (competition with agricultural
for water)
• Discuss these in later chapters
Chapter Headings
•
•
•
•
Drinking Water for Early Civilizations
Early Irrigation and Flood-Control Projects
Early Water Transportation Development
Early Hydropower Development
Early Irrigation and Flood Control
• Civilization centers developed where soils
were fertile
• For soils to be fertile nutrients must be
collected and deposited in an area so that
they become concentrated
– Flooding deposits rich mountain (volcanic)
soils in river floodplains
– Glaciers deposit rich topsoils at their terminus
and in wind blown loess
Early Irrigation and Flood Control
• Floodplains are often in dry areas that
require irrigation
• Nile River civilization is a good example
– Sediments from the mountains of Ethiopia
and Sudan are deposited in the floodplains of
Egypt
– Ancient Egyptians developed an elaborate
irrigation system for Nile floodplain
From Chapter 3
Simple devices for lifting water from the river into irrigation canals:
shadoufs, tambour or Achimedes screw, and saqia water wheel
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• Anasazi Indians developed irrigation
systems in Southwest desert region
around 950 AD
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• Brigham Young and Mormon followers began
extensive irrigation system in Salt Lake Valley of
Utah in 1847
• Region receives 15 in of annual rainfall
• Constructed diversion dams across rivers and
diverted water into irrigation ditches
– Small diversion dams were made of logs, rocks and
brush
– Irrigation ditches were made using horse-drawn plows
and hand digging
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• Construction of an irrigation ditch was not
simple
– A ditch too steep would cause fast flow that
would erode the ditch and wash it out
– A ditch that was too flat would not move water
• Rule of thumb was a fall of about 2 feet
per mile
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• Homestead Act passed in 1862
– Opened the floodgates of development in the
West
– Anyone over the age of 21 could acquire
ownership of 160 acres if
• Lived on it for 5 years
• Made improvements to the property
– Cost was $1.25 per acre
• Water for irrigation became a critical issue
Sears, Roebuck & Co. sold windmills to pump groundwater
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• In 1870’s Horace Greeley, editor of NY
Tribune promoted settlement in the West
with the phrase “Go West, Young Man”
• Time was ripe for western migration
– Civil War ended in 1865
– Transcontinental railroad completed in 1869
• Organized a settlement in Colorado (today
called Greeley) to replicate the irrigation
successes of Mormons in Utah
Early Irrigation in the U.S.
• Late 1800’s was a period of unusually wet
weather in West
• As normal rainfall returned many settlers without
irrigation water were forced to abandon their
land and move into town to work in other
professions
• Drought period in 1930’s forced more settlers to
abandon land and become migrant workers
– Described in “Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck
– Ken Burns “Dustbowl” on PBS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYOmjQO_UMw
Central Arizona Irrigation Project
Irrigation Today
• Irrigation today is extensive in western
U.S. and other areas of the world
• A number of associated problems
– Competition for water with urban sources
– Salinization of soils
– Sedimentation of reservoirs
– Effect on stream flow and water quality
• Discuss these in later chapters
Chapter Headings
•
•
•
•
Drinking Water for Early Civilizations
Early Irrigation and Flood-Control Projects
Early Water Transportation Development
Early Hydropower Development
Early Transportation Development
• One of the reasons civilization centers
developed near rivers is these were the
“interstates”
• River and canal systems used for boat
traffic
• Nile and Yangtze River are examples
• Later extensive canal system developed in
Europe
Felucca on the Nile in Egypt
Early Transportation Development
• Erie Canal constructed 1817-1825
– Connected Buffalo on Lake Erie to Albany on
Hudson River
– 363 miles
– Cut travel time from 20 days to 6 days
– Cut transportation costs from $100 to $5/ton
• Ohio & Erie Canal connected Ohio River
to Lake Erie
Check Google map to see full extent of St. Lawrence River
http://www.google.com/maphp?hl=en&tab=wl&q=
Canal boat pulled by mule on towpath on the C &O canal
In Washington DC; canal ran 184 miles from Cumberland MD to DC
Ohio River
Lake Erie
Ohio & Erie Canal elevation changes
Lock and lockkeeper’s house, Castlefield, England
Miraflores Lock, Panama Canal (“mules” on tracks)
Early Transportation Development
• Mississippi River has been through history
and continues to be a major transportation
system for U.S.
• Before steamboats keelboats and flatboats
were used to move produce down river
• After steamboats developed (1810) traffic
ran up and downstream
• Army Corps of Engineers responsible for
clearing snags
Jolly Flatboat men, George Caleb Bingham
Water Transport Today
• Water transportation not as critical today due to
rail and trucking industries
• Still a source of conflict
– Navigational needs vs. urban and agricultural use of
water
– In 2003 Corp of Engineers released water from Lake
Lanier and lower lakes on Chattahooche to float
barge traffic at Columbus
– Later that year drought conditions caused record low
lake levels
• We’ll discuss this in later chapters
Chapter Headings
•
•
•
•
Drinking Water for Early Civilizations
Early Irrigation and Flood-Control Projects
Early Water Transportation Development
Early Hydropower Development
Early Hydropower Development
• Water wheels were used to grind grain as early
as 100 BC in Greece
• Until the time of steam engines, water mills were
a major source of energy
• By 1800 there were 500,000 water mills in
Europe
• Mills ground corn and wheat, powered bellows
and hammers to make iron, ground ingredients
for paper, cut wood, and powered textile mills
Rock Run Grist Mill, Susquehanna State Park, MD
overshot mill for grinding corn
Grist mill
Bottom millstone exposed
Walter and Merrits. 2008. Science. Page 299
Littleton Mill undershot wheel, Littleton, NH
Textile mill diagram
Early Hydropower Development
• With the invention of the light bulb by Thomas
Edison in 1879 hydropower began to be used to
generate electricity
• One of the first generating plants was built at
Niagara Falls to supply electricity to Buffalo NY
– Designed by George Westinghouse
• Hydropower production peaked in the 1940’s
when it provided 1/3 of electricity consumed in
U.S.
Niagara Falls
Niagara Falls (right) and American Falls (left)
Hydroelectric plant was to the left of American Falls?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niagara_Falls
Two inlets above the fall diverted water into canals (right photo # 1 & 2); water
flowed down canals to power houses (left diagram)
http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/exhibits/panam/sel/electricity.html
George Westinghouse, 1846-1914
Westinghouse turbine, 1925
Hoover Dam
generators
Hydropower Today
• Hydropower is still important but ability to
transmit electricity is making some dams
less critical
• Movement to remove dams in some cases
• Focus on environmental impact of dams
on fish such as salmon
• We’ll discuss this in later chapters
Chapter 1 Summary
• Management of water resources has been
a hallmark of civilizations throughout
history
• Water managed to provide drinking water,
irrigation, flood control, navigation, and
power
• Although we’ve been managing water for
centuries, many old and new problems
now confront us