stage 1: agriforestry everywhere flat enough close to sea level besides infrastructure hubs where cities mostly are already. massive expansion of hydro. yes this destroys habitat. we should greatly expand field research by students in conjunction with test agriforestry farms to decentralize a large amount of population committed to state of the art land management.
stage 2: constitutional amendment that only municipalities/counties can be utility providers (county where no muni). all organized municipal districts receive DoE funding for modular small nuclear fission plants with dual usage to manage waste disposal (recycle metals, process plastics, ferment waste/sewage, etc) and manage indoor vertical farms for basic local nutrition wherever possible (free/foodstamps/works program aligned).
stage 3: inter-regional pipelines for ch4/h2o to balance 'grid' of excess energy/water production. the primary form of renewable enegy sharing will be turning atmo co2/waste h2o into ch4 for carbon neutral grid. tear down wires where appropriate.
stage 4: renewable energy density good enough, superconduct electriy rail along all the pipeline routes and pump atmo as needed into crust/space with accelerators.
I understand this is probably a BMF post but how does methane and "pumping atmosphere into space" relate to water scarcity lol
Seems like it could make it worse as methane breaks down into CO2 and H2O in the atmosphere but maybe there isn't enough generated H2O vapor to matter...
stage 4: ... pump atmo as needed into crust/space with accelerators.
All I can imagine is a space catapult slinging shipping containers full of car exhaust into space.
Also drastically slowing down the growth of desert communities, like Phoenix, Arizona would probably help.