Not really suggesting we water the chaparral. Just saying where it makes sense to interconnect water systems the better off we will be down the road when water does become scarce.We generate 7.5 Gigawatts annually along the Columbia/Snake Rivers ... easy to pump the water up to the High Desert out of The Dallas dam ... then just dump it in the Sacramento River headwaters ...
Though I'm not sure why growing more fuel reduces fire risk ... irrigate the chaparral and you'll have a bigger problem with fire ... it was the heavy rains from last year that brought on this fire hazard ...
Aqueducts are probably better solutions than pipelines but all tools should be in the tool belt. Desalinization still needs a way to move water.