The olive branch — a timeless Greek symbol of peace — could now signal a new beginning for drought-stricken California. All but completely built for total dryness, these trees are mighty impressive and may just save America’s biggest agriculture state, according to Grist.
With small, waxy leaves and the ability to sense drought and go dormant during rain-free times, olive trees are the perfect crop for California’s future – a future that soon enough, may not be able to support the crops currently growing.
That’s because California’s drought is very real — and goes far beyond a simple slowdown in rainfall. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Governor Jerry Brown has called for residents to voluntarily reduce water use by 20 percent, and a recently passed law makes wasting water illegal.
READ MORE: How Fog Could Solve California’s Drought
“[Farmers] are coming to the stark realization that, no matter what they do, there won’t be enough water to keep their trees alive,” Peter Fimrite of the San Francisco Gate writes.
Which is where olive trees come in.
Dan Flynn, executive director of the UC Davis Olive Center, told Grist that “there’s 10 times more California-grown olive oil than we had 10 years ago,” meaning an oil boom — olive oil, that is — already has legs and is off and running. That’s because the California climate is becoming nearly identical to the native habitat of olive trees: the Mediterranean. This makes them incredibly easy to farm, as they are significantly more sustainable than the almond tree, which, in many cases, they will displace.
Especially with the advent of almond milk, that nut has been in high demand. Almond trees require a lot of water, though, which makes them bad crops for the new California.
Health fanatics shouldn’t worry, though, as olive oil has been shown to be extremely good for you. Another plus is that an increased domestic supply could make for olive oil that’s both higher in quality and better tasting.
So what does all this mean?
We get tastier olive oil and become healthier as a country in the process? Yes. Most importantly, however, is that California can continue on as an agricultural powerhouse even as the climate changes.
This olive branch is bringing peace. Peace of mind, that is, that we don’t have to give up in the face of drought.
DON’T MISS: The Silver Lining To California’s Terrible Drought
Tag: UC Davis
See How This University Is Turning Trash Into Treasured Clean Energy
Within the dining halls at the University of California, Davis, tossed-out food scraps have recently become empowered—quite literally.
Waste is being converted to power in the campus’s newly unveiled Renewable Energy Anaerobic Digester (“biodigester” for short), a set of large, white tanks that eat 50 tons of trash per day and burp out 12,000 kilowatt hours of renewable electricity, right into the campus’s grid. That’s enough to power almost 1,000 homes for a year, says a UC Davis release.
The mound of trash feeding the biodigester is composed of not just UC Davis cafeteria food scraps, but also campus yard clippings and waste from local restaurants and businesses. The system is expected divert 20,000 tons of waste from local landfills each year.
Unveiled on Earth Day, it’s the U.S.’s largest anaerobic biodigester on a college campus, and it owes its existence to technology developed by UC Davis biological and agricultural engineering professor Ruihong Zhang. Anaerobic digestion isn’t exactly a new concept, but the UC Davis biodigester, built using Zhang’s technology, can consume more waste—and a greater variety of it—than previous versions, significantly increasing its efficiency.
Zhang had been working to get her patented technology out of the lab and onto the campus grid for nearly a decade, but found funding to be a major obstacle. When the university partnered with Sacramento-based CleanWorld—a tech company focused on anaerobic digestion systems—the UC Davis biodigester finally had the means to reach commercial scale. CleanWorld paid for the majority of the $8.5 million biodigester with private equity and commercial loans—though $2 million in public assistance came from the U.S. Department of Energy and the California Energy Commission.
Here’s hoping that other U.S. universities take note, and find ways to get their food scraps—and campuses—similarly empowered.
This Small California Community Might Just Solve America’s Energy Problems
The West Village at California’s UC Davis campus may soon become the nation’s largest planned community to achieve zero net energy consumption. The project, which organizers say will eventually house 3,000 students, 500 faculty and their families, as well as retail and commercial buildings, is 87% of the way to zero energy consumption, and expects to reach its goal by 2015. An added bonus for Mother Earth: The West Village produces zero carbon emissions.