Dialogue — the Wilson Center’s award-winning television and radio program that explores the world of ideas through weekly, half-hour conversations with renowned public figures, scholars, journalists, and authors — featured “Choke Point: The World’s Looming Water Crisis.”

JENNIFER TURNER

Director of the China Environment Forum for 11 years, her current projects are focused on U.S.-China energy and climate cooperation, how energy development impacts China’s water resources, China’s environmental governance, and pollution in Lake Tai.

Jennifer Turner, director of the China Environment Forum at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and Keith Schneider, senior editor at Circle of Blue and former New York Times national correspondent, discussed the security threats caused by pollution, climate change, and the growing “choke point” between scarce freshwater supplies and increasing energy demands.

Over the past year, Circle of Blue completed first-of-its-kind, in-depth reporting about the struggles between water and energy, which have profound global implications on everything from food prices to adaptation to climate change. From the coal mines of West Virginia to hydraulic fracturing of natural gas wells in Michigan, Circle of Blue began exploring the “choke points” in U.S. energy production in June 2010.

KEITH SCHNEIDER

Manages Circle of Blue’s story development, reporting, editing, and production. A nationally known journalist and environmental policy expert, he was — for over a decade — a national correspondent for The New York Times, where he is a special writer on energy, real estate, business, and technology.

Read his full bio…

In December 2010, the choke point coverage expanded, in partnership with the China Environment Forum, to the northern coal fields of Inner Mongolia and the rivers of southern China’s hydropower region. In both countries, Circle of Blue documented striking similarities between the increasing demand for energy and the decreasing supplies of freshwater sources that are crucial for energy production.

To hear about this Choke Point reporting, as well as plans to expand it in the future, tune in to the program on the MHZ Worldview channel here.

About dialogue
Since 1988, dialogue has offered informed discussion on important ideas and issues in national and international affairs and history, as well as culture—providing commentary that goes beyond the superficial analysis presented in many of today’s talk shows. The series aims to provide foreign perspectives on world affairs, with presidents, ambassadors, cabinet ministers, and scholars as guests. The program is available to 2.3 million households in the Washington, D.C. metro area via broadcast on MHz Networks digital channel 30.1. The program is also available on cable, satellite, and telco. The show is also available throughout the U.S. on MHz Networks’ national channel, MHz Worldview, to nearly 27 million households, via broadcast and cable affiliates, as well as via DirecTV and WorldTV (G19) satellite.

• Dialogue Worldview — Choke Point: China
• National distribution
• Facebook
• Twitter: @JohnMilewski
• YouTube
• iTunes: Search “dialogue at the woodrow wilson center”

About Circle of Blue
Circle of Blue is the international, non-partisan network of leading journalists, scientists, and designers that reports and presents the information necessary to respond to the global freshwater crisis. It publishes WaterNews, the daily go-to source for global water news and data. Circle of Blue — a non-profit affiliate of the California-based Pacific Institute, an international water, climate, and policy think tank — is funded by donations from individuals and foundations that believe informed policy makers and the public make better decisions. Click here to support Circle of Blue’s reporting.

About China Environment Forum
Since 1997, the China Environment Forum (CEF) has been active in creating programming and publications to encourage dialogue among U.S. and Chinese scholars, policymakers, businesses, and nongovernmental organizations on environmental and energy challenges in China. CEF has implemented projects, workshops, and exchanges that have brought together environmental policy experts to explore the most imperative environmental and sustainable-development issues facing China. The networks built and the knowledge gathered through meetings, publications, and research activities have established CEF as one of the most reliable sources for China-environment information and have given CEF the capacity to undertake long-term and specialized projects on topics, such as building new U.S.-China energy and climate networks, the water-energy nexus in China, environmental governance, food safety, water management, nongovernmental organization development, environmental justice, and municipal financing for environmental infrastructure.

TOBY SMITH

Twitter: @tobysmithphoto

Toby Smith, an award-winning photographer specializing in energy and environment matters, was a member of Circle of Blue’s Choke Point: China reporting team.

Read his full bio…

Smith, an award-winning contemporary reportage photographer specializing in energy and environment matters, was a key player on the Circle of Blue team, documenting China’s water-energy nexus from his unique lens.

Smith’s time is divided between long-term personal, international, editorial, and contemporary works for exhibition. His feature stills and video work have been published by clients such as GEO, Sunday Telegraph, Sunday Times, The Guardian, Fortune, TIME, The New York Times, BBC, and Sky News. Recent projects have included an undercover expose on illegal logging in Madagascar, which snowballed into an international investigation, and his renewable-energy project from Scotland has been awarded an “Innovation in Storytelling” grant for publication by National Geographic online. Reach Smith at toby@shootunit.com

For more of Smith’s work from China, check out Circle of Blue’s Choke Point: China package, which traces the confrontation of water scarcity and energy demand in the world’s fastest-growing industrial economy.

• Complete Package
• Photo Slideshows
• Smith’s Wind Photos

BRETT WALTON

Twitter: @waltonwater

Brett Walton is a Circle of Blue reporter, specializing in water pricing and infrastructure, as well as energy intersections in the Western U.S.

Read his full bio…

Over the past year, Circle of Blue has completed unprecedented, in-depth reporting about the struggles between water and energy, which have profound global implications on everything from food prices to adaptation to climate change. Beginning in June 2010, Walton defined these “choke points” in U.S. energy production from the thermopower facilities in the South to the Hoover Dam in the West.

The “choke point” analysis has since been expanded, with reporting from China beginning in December 2010. In both countries, Circle of Blue has documented striking similarities between the increasing demand for energy and the decreasing supplies of freshwater sources that are crucial for energy production, and Walton’s work has been highlighted in Circle of Blue presentations at premiere conferences such as the World Economic Forum and the Society of Environmental Journalists.

In June 2010, Walton broke the story of a small Alaskan town’s plan to export 2.9 billion gallons a year across the Pacific Ocean to India. The story has since been covered by National Geographic,  The Atlantic, and other mainstream media outlets.

Walton, a Seattle-based Circle of Blue reporter since October 2009, has also reported heavily on U.S. water pricing and infrastructure. Last February, Walton launched the popular Federal Water Tap, a weekly digest of U.S. water policy.

From a base in Santa Fe, Walton and the other fellows will travel to energy-development sites in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, meeting with utility operators, industry representatives, scientists, and energy experts along the way. Fellows will:

• learn about solar energy and agriculture in Colorado’s San Luis Valley;
• visit an algae farm on the Southern Ute Indian Reservation;
• observe natural gas-drilling sites in Colorado’s San Juan Basin;
• tour geothermal- and solar-energy projects in Jemez, New Mexico;
• discuss the connection between water, energy, and climate change while at Valles Caldera Preserve

Journalists attending the institute have written for The New York Times, Forbes, High Country News, The Durango Herald, and The Arizona Republic. Other fellows are photojournalists or have worked in television production for outlets such as Voice of America.

IJNR is a Missoula, Montana-based nonprofit that trains journalists covering natural-resource issues. Led by Frank E. Allen, a former environment editor for The Wall Street Journal, the institute has served more than 600 journalists during 47 field expeditions, since its inception in 1995.

During 2011, Circle of Blue has collaborated with the China Environment Forum at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars to report on energy demand and water supply in China. Their extensive coverage and reporting included over a dozen presentations of the results in China. The context for this coverage—called Choke Point: China—is positioned as follows:

“Over the last decade alone, 70 million new jobs emerged from an economy that this year, according to the World Bank and other authorities, generated the world’s largest markets for cars, steel, cement, glass, housing, energy, power plants, wind turbines, solar panels, highways, high-speed rail systems, airports and other basic supplies and civic equipment to support a modern economy.

Yet, like a tectonic fault line, underlying China’s new standing in the world is an increasingly fierce competition between energy and water that threatens to upend China’s progress.”

Last week in Stockholm, the 23rd World Water Week convened and could have featured the tag line, Choke Point: World.

Read the full report by Wilcox here.

Students in Ball State University's immersive learning program work on a Circle of Blue project.

Kelly Shea, ’11, strives to make hope visible. The journalism graphics major led a team of Ball State students to develop information graphics for global news organization Circle of Blue, a consortium of leading journalists, design experts, and scientists dedicated to chronicling the murky intricacies of the global water crisis.

In fall 2010, Shea and a handful of her peers—mentored by multimedia journalism professor Jennifer Palilonis—created interactive graphics that visually convey the elaborate statistics and complex stories Circle of Blue has been reporting since its inception in 2002. The immersive learning experience exposed impassioned students to the demands of professional journalism and the significance of water scarcity on the sweeping political, social, and economic issues of our time.

Read the full story on the Ball State University website here.

TRAVERSE CITY, Michigan — The World Economic Forum, the Geneva-based organization best known for convening global leaders through its annual conference in Davos, Switzerland, has appointed J. Carl Ganter, co-founder and director for Circle of Blue, to its Global Agenda Council on Water Security.

According to the Forum, the Global Agenda Councils represent “the world’s foremost interdisciplinary brain trust of innovative thinking and idea exchange on global issues.”

“The availability and management of clean water is the most important challenge we face today for our health, economy, energy, food, and our future,” Ganter said. “The position on the Council offers a rare opportunity to work with some of the world’s most passionate, talented people who are coming together to help solve very complex problems.”

Established four years ago, the Global Agenda Councils act as a catalyst to monitor and address key issues, including water, energy, food, climate, trade, and nuclear security. Each council has between 15 and 20 members, providing insights and recommendations for world leaders in business, technology, and government.

Ganter is an award-winning photojournalist, reporter, and broadcaster who is widely credited with helping to shape the multimedia era. He co-founded Circle of Blue 10 years ago when he first saw the need for a trusted, central source of information on the global water crisis.

More than five million people die each year due to a lack of safe drinking water, and the United Nations estimates that 5.5 billion people will lack adequate access to fresh water in the next 20 years. Water scarcity and pollution have emerged as serious threats to peoples and businesses around the world. Agriculture and energy production are the leading users of water worldwide.

Over the past year, Circle of Blue has completed unprecedented, in-depth reporting about the struggles between water and energy, which have profound global implications on everything from food prices to adaptation to climate change. From the coal mines of West Virginia to hydraulic fracturing of natural gas wells in Michigan, Circle of Blue began exploring the “choke points” in U.S. energy production in June 2010.

In December 2010, the choke point coverage expanded to the northern coal fields of Inner Mongolia and the rivers of southern China’s hydropower region. In both countries, Circle of Blue documented striking similarities between the increasing demand for energy and the decreasing supplies of freshwater sources that are crucial for energy production.

“Water security needs to be defined in the broadest sense,” Ganter said. “It means healthy Great Lakes, which supply water to 30 million people. It means access to safe drinking water in fragile states like Yemen and the Middle East. It means water to grow food in famine-stricken East Africa. We all have to roll up our sleeves — these aren’t easy challenges.”

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences wrote in 2010, “Circle of Blue is filling a niche by providing specialized content that is considered essential by an audience of shared interests but that can’t be found in such detail anywhere else. In many ways, it is reflective of a shift in how we define journalism, or at the very least, in how we go about producing and sharing it.”

Circle of Blue, a nonprofit organization and affiliate of the California-based Pacific Institute, is funded by donations from individuals and foundations that believe informed policy makers and the public make better decisions. Click here to support Circle of Blue’s reporting.

About Circle of Blue
Circle of Blue is the international, nonpartisan network of leading journalists, scientists, and designers that reports and presents the information necessary to respond to the global freshwater crisis. It is a nonprofit affiliate of the Pacific Institute, an international water, climate, and policy think tank, and it publishes WaterNews, the daily go-to source for global water news and data.    www.circleofblue.org

About the World Economic Forum
The World Economic Forum is an independent international organization, committed to improving the state of the world by engaging leaders in partnerships to shape global, regional, and industrial agendas. Incorporated as a foundation in 1971 and based in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Economic Forum is impartial and not-for-profit; it is tied to no political, partisan, or national interests. www.weforum.org

SINGAPORE — WaterLeader, the journal of the Institute of Water Policy in Singapore, features a special Circle of Blue Choke Point: China essay and photography gallery.

The June 2011 issue is distributed to the estimated 14,000 attendees of the Singapore International Water Week (SIWW), the annual conference run by the Public Utilities Board of Singapore. It features “engaging and insightful” works that “reflect on various facets of Sustainable Water ‘Solutions for the Changing Urban Environment,’ this year’s theme for SIWW.”

The Institute says it “has quickly become a centre for conducting cutting-edge water policy research, education initiatives, and public dialoguing particularly within Asia, and increasingly around the world.”

In its Choke Point series, Circle of Blue found that demand for energy is testing water supplies and economic stability in the U.S. and China.

Download a pdf of the WaterLeader issue here.

Click here to see the infographics created by Ball State University students for Circle of Blue’s Choke Point: China series.