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The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has now dumped 96 million balls into local reservoirs to reduce evaporation and block sunlight from encouraging algae growth and toxic chemical reactions. The balls are coated with a chemical that blocks ultraviolet light and helps the spheres last as long as 25 years.

DuPont Fabros Technology's Ashburn Corporate Campus (ACC) now uses reclaimed water for the four data centers with evaporative cooling plants.

Outdoor retailer REI retrofitted its Seattle data center, resulting in a 93 percent reduction in the cooling energy used

In a creative attempt to protect California's waning water supply, Los Angeles released 20,000 "shade balls" into the LA Reservoir. According to researchers, shade balls could reduce surface evaporation by 85 to 90 percent, protect water quality by preventing chemical reactions triggered by sunlight, deter birds and other wildlife, and protect the water from rain and wind-blown dust. 

As a punishing drought continues to grip California and other areas, scientists are exploring hardy succulents as a pathway to genetically engineer plants to use less water. Agave and other succulents such as the prickly pear, pineapple and vanilla have evolved to perform a different kind of photosynthesis that enable their survival in semiarid environments. These species absorb most of their carbon dioxide at night rather than during the day, as most plants do, meaning less water evaporates off the leaves through transpiration. 

This month, General Electric announced that it is developing a desalination technology that freezes seawater to separate salt crystals from water, at a 20 percent lower cost compared to conventional thermal evaporation approaches. Meanwhile, Veolia and Masdar unveiled a new renewable energy-powered pilot facility that also reduces the costs of desalination.