Sep 9, 2026 · 44 min · 11 segments
Subscribe to the newsletter: New Wave | Hugo Rauch | Substack \*\*\** 🌊 Water’s Mispriced Opportunity Why one of the world’s most essential markets may also be one of venture capital’s most…
Hugo RauchHostI don't have the exact metrics, but it's probably somewhere around 150, 200 liters per day per person overall on average, where there is somewhat of an industry goal or maybe a sector goal to try to get people down to 50 liters per day.
Unlike, you know, electricity is kind of more, you know, virtual and easy to, you know, move across transmission lines.
But one thing that's consistent with energy is when water becomes in crisis mode, just like in energy, you do energy efficiency programs.
What we see in water when all of a sudden there's a water scarcity event, like, you know, you've got these day zero events, if you've heard of that, like Cape Town.
a few years ago had where the water situation was so bad, like they were going to run out of water.
There's a lot of investing that comes in alongside, just like in energy, we need, you know, the first move is energy efficiency and then adding new generation, for example, solar and wind.
And unfortunately, the example you gave, restarting coal plants, which is terrible.
There's a lot of efficiency programs that can come in and it's not just lower flow toilets, but really thinking about irrigation, about personal water use and water pricing gets into that.
We've seen, as I mentioned, water rates have been rising globally two to three times global GDP.
And that spike now motivates consumers to think about their water use and reduce.
But also, just like in energy, adding new generation with wind and solar, in water, we can add new water capacity through water reuse and seawater desalination, which adds essentially new water into the mix, too.
I don't have the exact metrics, but it's probably somewhere around 150, 200 liters per day per person overall on average, where there is somewhat of an industry goal or maybe a sector goal to try to get people down to 50 liters per day.
Unlike, you know, electricity is kind of more, you know, virtual and easy to, you know, move across transmission lines.
But one thing that's consistent with energy is when water becomes in crisis mode, just like in energy, you do energy efficiency programs.
What we see in water when all of a sudden there's a water scarcity event, like, you know, you've got these day zero events, if you've heard of that, like Cape Town.
a few years ago had where the water situation was so bad, like they were going to run out of water.
There's a lot of investing that comes in alongside, just like in energy, we need, you know, the first move is energy efficiency and then adding new generation, for example, solar and wind.
And unfortunately, the example you gave, restarting coal plants, which is terrible.
There's a lot of efficiency programs that can come in and it's not just lower flow toilets, but really thinking about irrigation, about personal water use and water pricing gets into that.
We've seen, as I mentioned, water rates have been rising globally two to three times global GDP.
And that spike now motivates consumers to think about their water use and reduce.
But also, just like in energy, adding new generation with wind and solar, in water, we can add new water capacity through water reuse and seawater desalination, which adds essentially new water into the mix, too.
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