Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt announced today that he will become the chair of a company that plans to develop massive water projects in the Middle East. Babbitt, a lawyer who headed up the Interior Department during the Clinton administration, has since earned the ire of environmentalists by advising two companies seeking to develop parts of the California coast. His new and as-yet-unnamed business will be a subsidiary of Cadiz Inc., which has also drawn fire from environmentalists over its plan to sell large amounts of water from underneath the Mojave Desert. Babbitt says he will not be involved in the Mojave Desert project but will be wholly dedicated to creating desalinization programs, distribution and management systems, and other water projects in the Middle East.
