Water: Where will it come from in 2050?

[Michaelangelica]

i would have thought the USA would have enough problems of its own?

US and China Increase Efforts to Protect China's Water Resources

 

The U.S. and China signed an agreement March 27 to expand the cooperative program that provides U.S. technical assistance to help improve and protect water quality and access to safe and sustainable water resources in China. Increasing water conservation and efficiency in China will also help reduce energy consumption and air pollution locally and globally.

 

"This U.S.-China watershed agreement strengthens our partnership and advances the Bush Administration's agenda for sustainable economic development and environmental protection," said EPA Assistant Administrator for Water Benjamin H. Grumbles.

 

China faces mounting water resource challenges. Under this agreement, EPA will collaborate with China to explore better management solutions through technical assistance to improve the health and accessibility of China's water resources. The agreement provides a framework for cooperation between the countries in the following areas:

US and China Increase Efforts to Protect China's Water Resources

[hallenrm]

Here's a link to an interesting article entitled Water, Past present and future. Although the focus of the author is the water problem in India, I believe it would be useful for some people participating in this rather long discussion! :)

[Racoon]

Here's a link to an interesting article entitled Water, Past present and future. Although the focus of the author is the water problem in India, I believe it would be useful for some people participating in this rather long discussion! :)

 

 

Nice post Hallen.

 

India's water problems you would think be solved by the Monsoons!

Isn't that a lot of Rain??

 

 

What is your prognosis?

[Zythryn]

My (poor) understanding is that the monsoons dump tons of water, of which most runs off. What is needed is longer/more periods of more gentle rain that can soak into the ground.

Doesn't India also get much of its water from annual glacial melting?

[hallenrm]

Nice post Hallen.

 

India's water problems you would think be solved by the Monsoons!

Isn't that a lot of Rain??

 

 

What is your prognosis?

 

Not all! No one can harvest all the rain water (there are problems associated with storage). But still if most multistory housing blocks have provision for rain water harvesting, it may mitigate the travails of many city dwellers.

 

Doesn't India also get much of its water from annual glacial melting?

 

That's indeed true! but with the burgeoning population and rapid industrialization, pollution can not be avoided as many industries that consume much water never care to treat the affluents.

[Michaelangelica]

Thanks hallenrm

Unfortunately with my 44Kbs 3rd world system it took an age to download and then Easter hit. I will have a good read of it later in the week.

 

This was on ABC Landline today, I missed the show (Easter %^$) but here is the transcript.

The World Today - Growers hail new turf that can be watered with seawater

For those who really want a lawn in a dry climate this seems too good to be true

Grass that can be watered with:-

GREG MILLER: It can be water with saltwater, it can be water with freshwater, potable water, it can be water with dirty water, like your sewer water, it can be water with your dishwashing up water, it can be water � anything you can throw at it, it'll grow in.

 

TANYA NOLAN: Sea Isle Turf was developed in the United States almost 20 years ago, by a scientist at the University of Georgia.

[freeztar]

Here's a nice link on what one Aussie is doing to turn that salt land into fertile growth.

http://www.blog.thesietch.org/wp-content/permaculture.swf

 

Desert mushrooms! Is it true?

[Michaelangelica]

Here's a nice link on what one Aussie is doing to turn that salt land into fertile growth.

http://www.blog.thesietch.org/wp-content/permaculture.swf

 

Desert mushrooms! Is it true?

Fantastic link thanks

Nature is so resilient.

I have posted it on the Permaculture Forums

 

Deserts too have their ecology that needs preservation especially in untouched areas of Australia.

 

The Middle East has been so denuded by man anything is an improvement

I liked

"You can fix all the world's problems in a garden. . . . Most people don't know that"

[Michaelangelica]

How come "it"s and "in"s are red in this thread?

 

This is a innovative way of storing masses of rainwater when building a new basketball court, sports field, container terminal, parking lot, building, foundation, or maybe even a shopping center

Very simple and clever

No salty solution to nuclear waste - Radio Netherlands Worldwide - Independent thinking, independent voice - English

The invisible tank

Clever rainwater cellars from Zundert

 

by Thijs Westerbeek reporting from Westerpark in Amsterdam

 

12-03-2007

 

The watershell system

rm-25.jpgwma-25.jpgClick to hear the story in this edition of the Research File

 

 

The storage of rainwater in the Netherlands is 'hot'. Buffers can prevent flooding and intelligent usage of rainwater can save money. Several Dutch companies have realised that there is money to be made in the development of storage systems. One innovative example is the 'Watershell', an invention by a family business in the southern village of Zundert.

[Michaelangelica]

• # 26:50: Arizona State University
  
• # 35:30: Phoenix - an oasis city with more people and less water
  
• # 42:40: Clam shells reveal history of Mississippi delta
  

Science Show

May 25 radio show

Lawns in the desert.

Damming rivers, water allocation,fish, shrimp, wetlands and clams

[Michaelangelica]

A: From the fridge

Product results

 

Anew USA de-sal idea.

Professor Discovers Better Way To Desalinate Water

 

Science Daily — Chemical engineer Kamalesh Sirkar, PhD, a distinguished professor at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) and an expert in membrane separation technology, is leading a team of researchers to develop a breakthrough method to desalinate water. Sirkar, who holds more than 20 patents in the field of membrane separation, said that using his technology, engineers will be able to recover water from brines with the highest salt concentrations. The Bureau of Reclamation in the Department of Interior is funding the project.

 

Kamalesh K. Sirkar, PhD, is a distinguished professor of chemical engineering and the sponsored chair for membrane separations and the director for the Center for Membrane Technologies at New Jersey Institute of Technology.

 

"Our process will work especially well with brines holding salt concentrations above 5.5 percent," Sirkar said. Currently, 5.5 percent is the highest percentage of salt in brine that can be treated using reverse osmosis.

 

"We especially like our new process because we can fuel it with low grade, inexpensive waste heat," Sirkar said. "Cheap heat costs less, but can heat brine efficiently."

 

ScienceDaily: Professor Discovers Better Way To Desalinate Water

ScienceDaily: Professor Discovers Better Way To Desalinate Water

[Star30]

All solutions are short term unless there is a radical change in population. There is more capacity on the earth than we realize, but we cannot have people living where supplies are not available. Distribution, not supply is the biggest issue.

 

Bill

You are so right. In primitive times the people would pack up and move to find food, to hunt. Take American Indians or the Eastern Woodland Indians who would go out, hunt and set up temporary tepee homes. Some other groups moved in their entirety because they had the desire and motivation to survive.

The funny thing is it seems most Alien movies have Aliens coming to Earth in search of new resources because they depleted their own. Well, What do you think we are doing? Depleting our own resources and searching outside of Earth for new. So, why do people of any country insist on living in an uninhabitable or resource depleated environment. If you say Money, well Indians and Nomads didn't have money. Do or Die, Non?

 

For all those discussing technology, desalinating, and etc. You may enjoy the following web article: Rio Grande Regional Seawater Desalination Project

 

Thanks

[Michaelangelica]

You are so right. In primitive times the people would pack up and move to find food, to hunt. [/url]

 

Thanks

I'd like to see us pack up and move NY Toko cairo or even Sydney.

A World of Thirst

Poor sanitation. Pollution. Wasteful irrigation. The planet's freshwater supply is terribly managed

By Bret Schulte

Posted 5/27/07

 

Over the course of the past 40 years, north Africa's Lake Chad has shriveled to one tenth its earlier size, beset by decades of drought and agricultural irrigation that have sucked water from the rivers that feed it—even as the number of people whose lives depend on its existence has grown.

 

In 1990, the Lake Chad basin supported about 26 million people; by 2004 the total was 37.2 million. In the next 15 years, experts predict, the incredible shrinking lake and its tapped rivers will need to support 55 million. "You don't have much room for error at this point," says hydrologist Michael Coe.

Related News

 

* Pipelines and Lifelines

* Help From the Hydrant

* The Pipes That Deliver Our Water Are Aging. How Will the Repair Be Financed?

* Ways to Preserve Our Water Supply

* Sin City Is Wheeling and Dealing to Satisfy Its Cravings for Cool, Clear Water

* Harnessing a Mighty Force

* German Utility Soured on American Water (May 15)

* The Coming Water Crisis (Aug. 4, 2002)

* Video: Saving Money on Your Water Bill

* More From This Issue

 

The population growth has coincided with a 25 percent decrease in rainfall, with global warming very likely a factor. As oceans store more heat, the temperature difference between water and land dissipates, sapping power from rainmaking monsoons.

 

At the same time, desperate people are overusing wells. Coe recently concluded that water supplies in the basin are "stretched to their limits, and future needs will far outstrip the accessible supply."

. . .

. . .

In a report issued in November, the United Nations declared water "a global crisis," announcing that 55 member nations are failing to meet their water-related Millennium Development Goal target, agreed upon in 2000, of halving the proportion of people without clean water and sanitation by 2015.

. . .

One percent. Just 3 percent of the world's water is fresh. Of that, most is locked in the ground, glaciers, or ice caps.

That leaves about 1 percent for the world's 6.6 billion people.

Wasteful Irrigation, Poor Sanitation, and Pollution Plague the World's Freshwater Supply - US News and World Report

 

Date:25/03/2007

 

Climate change, pollution, over extraction of water and development are killing some of the world's most famous rivers including China's Yangtze, India's Ganges and Africa's Nile, conservation group WWF said on Tuesday.

Environment Agency - Abu Dhabi

Date: 25/03/2007

 

Another first for the UAE was highlighted at the Middle East Power & Water Conference 2007, with the seven emirates edging near the top of the global index for the highest water consumption per capita.

 

"The UAE has 114 water dams with a joint capacity of 118 million cubic metres of rain water.

Meanwhile, desalination pants for both drinking and industrial use provide an annual supply of 950 million cubic metres,"

Environment Agency - Abu Dhabi

(How much does all the extra dam-lakes, desalinated water, flood irrigation etc being used by agriculture and sweated & peed out by a few billion extra people effect global warming over the last 50-100 years? (Water vapour humidity is the major GHG. Has anyone ever measured it like we do CO2?)

[Monomer]

I read this in our latest newsletter:

 

A team of CSIRO researchers and partners have created drinking water fit for a Prime Minister out of stormwater previously left to flow down the gutter.

 

CSIRO Land and Water's Water Use and Reuse team at Urrbrae, led by Dr Peter Dillon, collected and bottled the water from a suburban Adelaide aquifer in what is believed to be the first urban stormwater to be bottled as safe drinking water in Australia.

 

Prime Minister John Howard, Environment and Water Resources Minister Malcolm Turnbull and CSIRO Chief Executive Dr Geoff Garrett were amongst the first to drink the water at a meeting of the Prime Minister's Science, Engineering and Innovation Council (PMSEIC) in Canberra on June 22.

 

The water was collected from reed bed-treated urban stormwater from Salisbury, SA, which had been stored in a limestone aquifer for 12 months and recovered. It is 93 per cent stormwater from 2005 and seven per cent brackish native groundwater, estimated to be 10,000 yrs old.

 

It was rigorously tested and meets all drinking water criteria. Risk assessment and management was performed by Senior Research Scientist Dr Declan Page.

 

The bottling aimed to demonstrate the work of the Aquifer Storage Transfer and Recovery (ASTR) project, which involves CSIRO, United Water, the City of Salisbury, SA Water and the SA Department of Land, Water and Biodiversity Conservation.

 

"We are trying to show the value of what we currently let flow down our gutters by developing the demonstration project and also management frameworks that can be replicated," Dr Dillon says.

 

"There is potential for 250GL of this water to be harvested a year in the three cities studied so far, and the cost is less than current mains water supplies if the flood mitigation and land value benefits are also considered."

 

Dr Dillon, who was at the July 22 meeting where Dr Garrett presented Mr Howard a bottle of the water, says he hopes this project will change the way people treat stormwater.

 

"I hope people who drink this water will see stormwater differently and value it as a precious resource," Dr Dillon says.

 

"Cities are highly effective catchments yielding at least 4000 times more run-off per hectare than the Murray Basin. In most Australian capitals more water flows down gutters than is supplied through mains.

 

"Stormwater harvesting, along with rainwater tanks, are the most greenhouse-friendly approach to water supply expansion, and belong in the portfolio of solutions advocated to PMSEIC.

 

"Some governments have yet to establish drought and emergency supplies, but in the meantime councils with vision and suitable aquifers are able to reduce demand on city water supplies on a commercial footing.

 

"Ultimately we have shown potential for this water to go into mains supplies. Further research is required to validate this and then make these methods available."

 

 

There was a link to this website ASTR: Welcome to the Aquifer Storage Transfer and Recovery

[Star30]

Good to know, Good post Monomer. I don't know why this hasn't been implemented already.

 

Michaelangelica, I was just saying, I wouldn't move to a place with issues I couldn't find a solution(s) for as I would move away from the same. That's not to say I wouldn't give it my all, but come on...

[Michaelangelica]

Saturday, April 21, 2007

NIOT's OTEC-based Desalination Plant

 

Chennai-based National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT) has achieved a world's first in sustainable technology by building a floating water desalination plant. But what's so great about putting a desalination plant on a barge? The uniqueness is in the detail of the technology used.

 

The Technology

 

"The plant is mounted on a 65-metre-long by 16-metre-thick barge. The ocean's surface water is boiled inside a vacuum container. The vapour created in the flash boil process is condensed through a refrigeration process with the help of deep-sea water collected from nearly 600 metres below the surface of the sea."

 

Thus this plant benefits from NIOT's cutting edge research and plans on OTEC, a fledgling clean energy technology which has huge potential. OTEC (Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion) is a method to use the energy difference between the surface of the ocean, which is exposed to the sun, and the water at lower levels, which not being exposed to the sun is much cooler.

 

The temperature of the water 600m below the surface was one third of the temperature at the surface, but bringing it to the surface presented the biggest challenge of the project. The water was brought up using one meter thick HDPE pipes, which come in 12m lengths, and when assembled the 600m stretch weighed 100 tonnes. Further the salinity of the seawater would make the pipes float, necessitating the attachment of heavy weights. The salinity however is useful in another way - the clean water is filled into water bags each capable of holding 200,000 liters, which were then easily towed to the shore since clean water floats on saline water.

The Indic View: NIOT's OTEC-based Desalination Plant - India Energy and Infrastructure

 

New Chinese solar de-salinator

But our device makes use of solar power. The only costs are the heliostat system and the infrastructure construction. It is the most economical and eco-friendly desalination method invented so far," said Zhou.

 

Furthermore, a special heliostat, invented by a scientist in the team, costs only a quarter of the normal price but still generates the same amount of energy, Zhou told China Daily.

 

Zhou did not reveal the exact cost for fresh water production, but said it would definitely be much lower than the current technologies,

Device offers end to fresh water shortage

 

desalination plant by environmental graffiti, a uk based environmental blog

The French utility services group Veolia has won a contract worth 702 million euros (945 million dollars) to design and build a water desalination plant in Saudi Arabia. The plant is expected to be completed by 2010 and will desalinate 800,000 cubic meters of water per day. Saudi Arabia already produces 24% of the total world capacity of freshwater using desalination.

Hugg /

[Michaelangelica]

A home-made grey water system.

Perhaps not suitable for a small suburban garden?

But an interesting article and project anyhow

Greywater Ecuador La lagrima purificadora - Appropedia: The sustainability wiki

 

 

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. (KCBS) -- California voters could decide as early as February whether to spend billions of dollars to build dams and a canal to divert water around the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Monday.The governor's plan includes $4.5 billion for two reservoirs, $1 billion for a canal and $450 million for water conservation efforts.

Will Halliburton build them?;)

KCBS - Gov Pushes New Water Plan