Scott Slater has a plan. It is not a popular plan, but he wants to pump 814 billion gallons of water from under the Mojave Desert to Los Angeles and other drought-stricken communities in southern California, and make more than $2 billion doing so.

 

“Yes, it’s quite a lot of money,” Slater, the 57-year-old chief executive of Cadiz Inc, says as he stands in front of a scale model of the project in the foyer of the company’s office on the 28th and top floor of a LA city centre office block. “It’s worth whatever the community who wants the water is willing to pay for it to meet their demands.”