Texas is giving its scarce water to thirsty refineries, plastics plants and AI data centers even as its population booms and its infrastructure ages. Zero guesses what happens next.

10 comments

1. From Bloomberg:

   “Imagine being marched by force through a desert with barely anything to drink while your captor repeatedly cools himself by dumping gallons of water on his head, and maybe you’ll start to get a sense of what it’s like to live in Texas these days.”

2. My guess is that Wheels gets to cash in while his constituents get to suffer the consequences.

3. Better than golf courses I guess.

4. As someone who spent some formative years in the state, the majority of Texans are either so toxic that they desire this outcome or so deluded they think they’re tough enough to endure it. The state has an inborn authoritarian streak many miles wide and is corrupted from the core by fossil capitalism.

   The voters are by and large low-information. The fate of the state is regrettable for those who have been gerrymandered out of having a say, but they should do everything they can to leave. I was determined and fortunate enough to vote with my feet and have never regretted it for even a second. 

   Texas is locked into a doom spiral more far-reaching than any tornado, and most are gaslit enough to think they’ll survive the ride and fatalistic enough not to care if they don’t. 

   But there’s an old book about Texas titled *The Super-Americans*, and its thesis holds. As goes Texas, so will go most of the rest of this rotten, hollowed-out carcass of a nation. I’m working on leaving it too, but, tbh, Americans (including myself) amply deserve what’s coming.

5. Privatize the profits, socialize the consequences

6. That area of Southern Texas needs a new business model to beat back the fossil fuel industry. How about exporting renewable energy to other states during peak load? The state of Texas is one of the best at implementing renewables and battery storage.

7. Isn’t West Texas floating on a sea of polluted fracking water that’s making into the water supply too?

8. Im curious to know what countries will americans seek refuge in when the us goes scorched earth

9. Water Knife is an excellent book!

10. Every state is doing this thanks to neo liberals bowing down to corporations and oligarchs.

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