Water

[orezok]

100,000 gallons is literally a drop in the bucket. Practical desalination needs to produce 100,000,000 gallons a day.

The desal plant in San Diego (actually Carlsbad a couple of miles north) produces 54,000,000 gallons per day. Enough for 400,000 people. It’s doable.

 

[2LaneCruzer]

Maybe TMI, but that's how we were brought up as kids. I know people today with dug wells that still do this.

To my knowledge, we don't have many dug wells, if any at all, around here. I recall my grandparents had a cistern at their farm house, but no indoor plumbing. We have a drilled well, drilled in the early 70's when our home was built in what was then a very rural area, and it has been more than adequate for our needs.

 

[dmccarty]

To my knowledge, we don't have many dug wells, if any at all, around here. I recall my grandparents had a cistern at their farm house, but no indoor plumbing. We have a drilled well, drilled in the early 70's when our home was built in what was then a very rural area, and it has been more than adequate for our needs.

I have seen some dug wells in my area, they usually have a large concrete pipe, 24-36" in diameter, sticking well above grade, and are at homes that were built a long time ago. I can think of four real quick, but one was filled in when the house was torn town. I don't know if it is legal to have a dug well anymore, all of the "recent" wells are drilled.

We did think about putting in a cistern, along with the well, when we built the house but could not justify the cost of the cistern.

Later,
Dan

 

[jyoutz]

But that hasn’t happened. And the world isn’t going to end in 9 years, either.
10’ above sea level is more at risk for bad storms than claimed rising sea levels.
Sea levels can drop, too.

With glaciers melting in Greenland and Alaska, see levels aren’t going to go down.

 

[Raul-02]

I ran across this article this morning. Why was it not headlines in every coastal newspaper in the US? Desalination may become the default fresh water source on coastlines.

Fluorine nanostructures can desalinate water 2,400 times faster than carbon nanotubes

The method is "several thousand times faster" than systems currently available on the market.

interestingengineering.com

California was refusing to allow it because according to some idiots there the salinity would remain local and be a problem for some sea life. This is a phenomenon not observed at any desalination plant so far. there is a study out of Kuwait on long-term salinity made near outfall of Az Zour Power and Desalination Plant in South Kuwait. They found the local salinity was increased but were only able to use words like "may," "might," and "could" to discuss any possible negative sea life impact. So they didn't actually see any harm.
Normally the salt is around 35 - 37 PPT the straight, but the hyper-local salinity right at the mouth of the outfall was 50 ppt.
Salinity is not constant in the oceans, there is an oval of 37+PPT The Mediterranean, Baltic sea, and black sea are very high also.

Ocean salinity

There are many chemicals in seawater that make it salty. Most of them get there from rivers carrying chemicals dissolved out of rock and soil. The main one is sodium chloride, often just called salt. Most seawater has about 35 g (7 teaspoons) of salt in every 1,000 g (about a litre) of water...

www.sciencelearn.org.nz

Localized hyper saline waters in Arabian Gulf from desalination activity--an example from South Kuwait - PubMed

Desalination is the only means of reliable water supply in most of the Arabian Gulf States including Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates. Huge desalination capacities are installed on the western margin of the Arabian Gulf contributing to increased salinity off the...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[Raul-02]

How do you make a fluorine molecule unstable?

Easy. You give it good shove.

 

[Raul-02]

I ran across this article this morning. Why was it not headlines in every coastal newspaper in the US?

Too many big words.

 

[Jstpssng]

I have seen some dug wells in my area, they usually have a large concrete pipe, 24-36" in diameter, sticking well above grade, and are at homes that were built a long time ago. I can think of four real quick, but one was filled in when the house was torn town. I don't know if it is legal to have a dug well anymore, all of the "recent" wells are drilled.

We did think about putting in a cistern, along with the well, when we built the house but could not justify the cost of the cistern.

Later,
Dan

They are still fairly common here. My mother's well was probably dug by my grandfather when he built the house in 1927 and is 10x12 feet, poured concrete walls with about 8 feet of water to where it runs out the overflow. I have never seen it go down below that, and they used to feed two houses plus keep 1/4 acre of greenhouses watered from it. When I was in HS we pumped it out, bleached it, and put crushed stone in the bottom
The problem is purity... it got more and more difficult to pass a water test so she has an in house UV water purifier in back of a pretty good sized filter.

 

[Raul-02]

I keep reading about sea levels rising to the point where coastal communities may be flooded.

And you will continue seeing articles about it until hell freezes over and the Sun goes supernova.
What those idiots don't (or won't) understand is that this wonderful absolutely delightful goldilocks period of geologic time that so favors humans and small mammals is just a small tick in the larger scheme of things.
The oceans have flooded the great plains many times, Great Glaciers churned their way across the planet, there were dinosaurs and then there weren't. And now there is a climate that favors humans. It's not going to last. Nothing does, the planet is dynamic, and there is no correct climate. We occupy maybe 10% of the planet and we think we can turn climate on and off like a light switch? How unbelievably arrogant and stupid.

 

[grsthegreat]

And you will continue seeing articles about it until hell freezes over and the Sun goes supernova.
What those idiots don't (or won't) understand is that this wonderful absolutely delightful goldilocks period of geologic time that so favors humans and small mammals is just a small tick in the larger scheme of things.
The oceans have flooded the great plains many times, Great Glaciers churned their way across the planet, there were dinosaurs and then there weren't. And now there is a climate that favors humans. It's not going to last. Nothing does, the planet is dynamic, and there is no correct climate. We occupy maybe 10% of the planet and we think we can turn climate on and off like a light switch? How unbelievably arrogant and stupid.

Then the dogs will take over earth…. Or so my lab hopes. They cant screw it up any more than we have.

 

[ultrarunner]

One dug well around here left over from 1920 AG use...

The home is in a 1950 tract development purchased by my co-worker...

They had no use for it until the last drought and someone said they should check it out.

Unlimited sweet water on their 6,000 feet lot.

Bought a Sears submersible pump and it keeps their in ground pool full...

What a great thing to have in California when I know folks spending 20 to 50k and coming up dry...

It's not that water is about a penny a gallon but GPD is restricted...

 

[Raul-02]

Then the dogs will take over earth…. Or so my lab hopes. They cant screw it up any more than we have.

Maybe. I suspect that whatever does come after us will be completely alien to anything we might have imagined.
Carbon-based, for sure. Mostly water, certainly. But after that, all bets are off.

I don't subscribe to the MAN = BAD, Manmade = bad line of illogic. This, because we did not come here from some other dimension. We are of the planet ERGO 100% native and 100% natural, so every single thing we do is 100% natural. It is not possible for us to do a thing that is unnatural.

All the things we work with are from here. I see the roads the buildings the garbage dumps, all of it as 100% natural. And in fact, Nature seems willing to adapt to the things we do. To work with us. For example; More and more lifeforms that never before did are now consuming plastics for nurishment.

There have been times when we **** where we ate, one time too many. I remember rivers on fire and running with a wild array of kaleidoscope colors. We paid a price for that kind of stupidity.

 

[/pine]

Henny Penny lives...!

 

[grsthegreat]

Who says were not alien race sent here…. Dont you watch Xfiles?

 

[grsthegreat]

And my dog keeps telling me……our days are numbered.

 

[Jstpssng]

Then the dogs will take over earth…. Or so my lab hopes. They cant screw it up any more than we have.

View attachment 755916

Nah, he wouldn't like that. Labs are too social, and enjoy our company.

Then again, some might argue that they already rule the roost...

 

[deserteagle71]

And in fact, Nature seems willing to adapt to the things we do. To work with us.

But...we are slowly overwhelming Nature by sheer numbers. If the population of us humans on this old earth continues to explode the way it has in the past 1000 years there is NO WAY the available natural resources will be able to cope. In the past 60 years the world's population has more than doubled! I'm afraid when "Nature" gets close to reaching a breaking point, it will do a "correction". That may result in a huge reduction in human population.

 

[Raul-02]

But...we are slowly overwhelming Nature by sheer numbers.

I don't think so.
Recall all the howling and wailing over peak oil? And then there was no such thing as peak oil?
Or the predictions that we'd run out because there are not more dinosaurs to ferment into oil Except oil is a mineral product from geology, not fossils.

We have done ourselves ( or rather our bretheren in poorer countries) some serious disservice by augmenting their food supplies and giving them medicines and medical care helped them learn how to get water, and all that helped them produce more (lots and lots more) fat happy babies.
Who doesn't like babies?
And now when times get hard and we can't give so much away (like during Covid) they all starve back to the sustainable populations that they they had before we meddled in their lives. It's ugly.

But we don't occupy much more than a lousy 10% of the earth so we are no where near maximum population density.

But you should be cheered. Japan's birthrate has fallen off a cliff and so too in Europe and the USA. Even Friggin China has seen it's birth rates fall. People have become so massively selfish that they won't have children.

But to your point more directly:
If humans become a burden on the planet, humans will develop a technology that can alleviate that burden just like we did with peak oil. That's how capitalism works; see a problem, fix it, and sell the cure.

But this girl seems to have the solution

 

[jyoutz]

I don't think so.
Recall all the howling and wailing over peak oil? And then there was no such thing as peak oil?
Or the predictions that we'd run out because there are not more dinosaurs to ferment into oil Except oil is a mineral product from geology, not fossils.

We have done ourselves ( or rather our bretheren in poorer countries) some serious disservice by augmenting their food supplies and giving them medicines and medical care helped them learn how to get water, and all that helped them produce more (lots and lots more) fat happy babies.
Who doesn't like babies?
And now when times get hard and we can't give so much away (like during Covid) they all starve back to the sustainable populations that they they had before we meddled in their lives. It's ugly.

But we don't occupy much more than a lousy 10% of the earth so we are no where near maximum population density.

But you should be cheered. Japan's birthrate has fallen off a cliff and so too in Europe and the USA. Even Friggin China has seen it's birth rates fall. People have become so massively selfish that they won't have children.

But to your point more directly:
If humans become a burden on the planet, humans will develop a technology that can alleviate that burden just like we did with peak oil. That's how capitalism works; see a problem, fix it, and sell the cure.

But this girl seems to have the solution

Petroleum is carbon based (organic) not mineral based. Organic chemistry is focused on petroleum chemicals.

 

[Jstpssng]

I don't think so.
Recall all the howling and wailing over peak oil? And then there was no such thing as peak oil?
Or the predictions that we'd run out because there are not more dinosaurs to ferment into oil Except oil is a mineral product from geology, not fossils.

We have done ourselves ( or rather our bretheren in poorer countries) some serious disservice by augmenting their food supplies and giving them medicines and medical care helped them learn how to get water, and all that helped them produce more (lots and lots more) fat happy babies.
Who doesn't like babies?
And now when times get hard and we can't give so much away (like during Covid) they all starve back to the sustainable populations that they they had before we meddled in their lives. It's ugly.

But we don't occupy much more than a lousy 10% of the earth so we are no where near maximum population density.

But you should be cheered. Japan's birthrate has fallen off a cliff and so too in Europe and the USA. Even Friggin China has seen it's birth rates fall. People have become so massively selfish that they won't have children.

But to your point more directly:
If humans become a burden on the planet, humans will develop a technology that can alleviate that burden just like we did with peak oil. That's how capitalism works; see a problem, fix it, and sell the cure.

But this girl seems to have the solution

I think "this girl" needs to realize if she want's to save the planet, the best thing to do is to stop breathing.