Water: Where will it come from in 2050?

[Michaelangelica]

Lighter Footstep: Five Things that are Worse than Global Warming

The Coming Water Crisis

 

The Coming Water Crisis

From the oceans we turn our attention to an even rarer resource: fresh water. Of all the water on earth, less than 3% is fresh.

Of this, some 70% is locked in glaciers and polar ice. Our survival depends on the tiny bit which is left.

Over a billion people already lack access to a safe supply of adequate drinking water.

These numbers will increase with world population. Here, again, is a clear link to climate change: as rainfall patters shift, so does the availability of fresh water.

But the real crisis is this: right now, our largest cities depend heavily on groundwater. Beijing, Buenos Aires, Mexico City -- and perhaps your own community -- draws its water from underground aquifers.

These aquifers take centuries to replenish, so it's unlikely their use on this scale is sustainable. The recent corporatization of drinking water is no accident: investors recognize the trends of shrinking supply and increasing demand.

This is the reason multinational companies are snapping up neglected municipal water infrastructures and throwing themselves into the bottled water business. Water is the Blue Gold of the 21st century.

How will we replace shrinking fresh water supplies? Desalinization of sea water is an obvious answer, but desalinization is expensive energy intensive. It would require the development of a distribution system that dwarfs the one by which we currently bring petroleum to market. We will have to seek out new ways to reprocess wastewater and reduce our current demand on groundwater supplies.

While changes will necessarily trickle down to the household level and will be neither cheap nor convenient, they are unavoidable if we wish to sustain our current rate of population growth.

There are no equivalents to carbon credits when it comes to water: you can't pay someone not to consume water on your behalf.

When it comes to dwindling fresh water supplies, there can be no smoke and mirrors. Stop drinking for a day, and you'll realize the pressing nature of thirst. The recent drought in the American Southwest and the threat of water rationing in places like Los Angeles are a preview of things to come.

Lighter Footstep: Five Things that are Worse than Global Warming | Green Options

[Michaelangelica]

You don't think of canada as being short of water

 

According to The Council of Canadians, currently in Canada, there are over 80 First Nations communities that do not have fresh tap water that is safe to drink. All water must be boiled before consuming in order to kill the harmful bacteria.

. . .

The United States is pressuring Canada to export water in bulk. A Washington think tank, called the Global Water and Energy Strategy Team, announced that bulk water exports from Canada will take place, because of our economic need to trade with the U.S., within the next couple of years.

 

Several American oil extraction industries are steering the Canadian government toward building a freshwater pipeline between Manitoba and Texas, for the purpose of extracting oil from the ground. This commercial use of freshwater will drain our existing supply of drinking water.

 

Canada is currently short of water. Presently, we have a ban on waste water use that forbids our own residents to turn a sprinkler on at night to water our lawns and gardens.

 

 

So if you use less chemical fertiliser in your garden you will need less water?

Mulch and organic matter must help but fertiliser?

"In many fertilizers you find ammonia. Ammonia is a salt; it dehydrates the life in the soil," Meyer said. "Over time, you will kill life in the soil and cause it to dehydrate."

. . .

"It is alive with all these things that, when it breaks down, provide nutrients plants are designed to take up," Meyer said.

 

Soil enriched with organic matter is better able to retain moisture, making the drudgery of watering less frequent, he said.

MLive.com: Everything Michigan

[Michaelangelica]

Big argument about Sydney's proposed de-sal plant.

It is very expensive

Still can't work out why they can't use base load electricty in Power plants

QUENTIN DEMPSTER: With the drought and expected crop failure in the Murray-Darling Basin, fruit and vegetable prices are expected to rise sharply soon.

 

With a carbon trading scheme coming no matter who wins the federal election electricity prices are also expected to rise significantly.

 

From June next year water prices for consumers in Greater Sydney, the Blue Mountains, Wollongong and the Illawarra, covering about 4.5 million people could rise by 30 per cent and more if you are a big water user.

 

Equipped with a state election mandate to build a $1.8 billion desalination plant at Kurnell, the Iemma government is now preparing the bill for consumers via its state-owned utility Sydney water.

 

Even if the desal plant is not needed to supplement drinking water, under the terms of the public private partnership consumers will pay to have it operationally ready.

 

A Sydney water submission to IPART, the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal this week revealed the fine print for the first time.

 

Shortly a studio debate.

 

First, the big water bill coming to a letter box near you.

 

At the moment the average household water bill is around $800 a year. To keep Sydney Water solvent and pay for the desalination plant which is to be expensively powered by renewable energy, and the big recycling schemes at Rouse Hill, Wollongong, St Marys and Fairfield, Sydney Water's asking IPART to approve a price rise per household of $275 over four years.

. . .

. . .

KERRY SCHOTT: If the desal plant's not operating, the cost of having it available and just being there is about $9 million per year and that's having the plant available and not producing any water.

 

The minute its producing water if it's going at full pelt, that's $55million. And the cost of water from the desal plant works out at 60 cents a kilolitre. And that compares to what I'm currently paying the catchment authority which is 56 cents a kilolitre. So its a little bit more expensive but its not that bad.

Stateline NSW

China running out of fresh water

For three decades, water has been indispensable in sustaining the rollicking economic expansion that has made China a world power. Now, China’s galloping, often wasteful style of economic growth is pushing the country toward a water crisis. Water pollution is rampant nationwide, while water scarcity has worsened severely in north China — even as demand keeps rising everywhere.

 

China is scouring the world for oil, natural gas and minerals to keep its economic machine humming. But trade deals cannot solve water problems. Water usage in China has quintupled since 1949, and leaders will increasingly face tough political choices as cities, industry and farming compete for a finite and unbalanced water supply.

 

One example is grain.

. . .

. . .

An economic powerhouse with more than 200 million people, it has limited rainfall and depends on groundwater for 60 percent of its supply. Other countries, like Yemen, India, Mexico and the United States, have aquifers that are being drained to dangerously low levels. But scientists say those below the North China Plain may be drained within 30 years.

 

“There’s no uncertainty,” said Richard Evans, a hydrologist who has worked in China for two decades and has served as a consultant to the World Bank and China’s Ministry of Water Resources. “The rate of decline is very clear, very well documented. They will run out of groundwater if the current rate continues.”

Water Scarcity Threatens China's Future - Environment - New York Times

[Michaelangelica]

Chemical film slows dam evaporation by 60pc: trials

 

Posted Tue Sep 4, 2007 2:05pm AEST

 

Australian laboratory trials of a new technology to reduce evaporation in dams has shown promising results.

 

Researchers are developing an ultra-thin chemical film to be placed on the surface of dams, and tests have shown it reduces evaporation loss by up to 60 per cent.

 

The film is made from a special biodegradable chemical that can be applied to dams every few days when evaporation rates are high.

 

Water authorities in south-east Queensland have calculated evaporation losses are equal to the annual consumption of 1.6 million households.

 

Project leader Professor David Solomon from Melbourne University told a conference today that the film offers a huge potential.

 

He says it has low environmental impact and is cost effective. More trials are planned in large public water storages and farm dams.

 

Chemical film slows dam evaporation by 60pc: trials - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

[Monomer]

Chemical film slows dam evaporation by 60pc: trials - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

 

That's interesting - approacing the water problem from a different angle. That's a lot of water to lose though evaporation.

 

Water authorities in south-east Queensland have calculated evaporation losses are equal to the annual consumption of 1.6 million households.

[Zythryn]

Water authorities in south-east Queensland have calculated evaporation losses are equal to the annual consumption of 1.6 million households.

 

Very interesting. First thing I would check though is does the evaporated water come back to earth as rain in an area desperate for water?

They could be saving water in one spot and not allowing it to fall on farmland:doh:

[Michaelangelica]

I agree Tecnology will help but we need to start thinking about the problem now

 

What's gone wrong?

 

As our world heats up, as pollution increases, as population grows and as our globe's resources of fresh water are tapped, we are faced with an environmental and humanitarian problem of mammoth proportions.

 

Demand for water is doubling every 20 years, outpacing population growth twice as fast. Currently 1.3 billion people don't have access to clean water and 2.5 billion lack proper sewage and sanitation. In less than 20 years, it is estimated that demand for fresh water will exceed the world's supply by over 50 percent.

 

The biggest drain on our water sources is agriculture, which accounts for 70 percent of the water used worldwide -- much of which is subsidized in the industrial world, providing little incentive for agribusiness to use conservation measures or less water-intensive crops.

. . .

. . .

Some see technology as the necessary fix -- or at least a step in the right direction. As the BBC reports:

 

New technology can help, however, especially by cleaning up pollution and so making more water useable, and in agriculture, where water use can be made far more efficient. Drought-resistant plants can also help.

 

Drip irrigation drastically cuts the amount of water needed, low-pressure sprinklers are an improvement, and even building simple earth walls to trap rainfall is helpful.

 

Some countries are now treating waste water so that it can be used -- and drunk -- several times over.

 

Desalinization makes sea water available, but takes huge quantities of energy and leaves vast amounts of brine.

 

But many warn against relying on a "techno-fix" to solve our problems.

AlterNet: Environment: Our Drinkable Water Supply Is Vanishing

 

This seems like an interesting idea.

Linking the de-humidifiers (see previous posts) with afree energy source. Sound ideal as long as you have some wind

The windmill that produces water out of air

His solution is an innovative windmill which, unlike the conventional three blades, has several blades arranged around a vertical column that can take wind from any direction.

 

The secret lies in a cooling process kicked off by the blades which propel the air into a "chiller" box where water molecules condense on specially designed plates.

 

Whisson points to ancient tribes in the area that is now Ukraine who used pyramid-shaped rock structures to cool air and produce their water.

 

The design of his collection plates was also assisted by analysing the body of a beetle that has adapted to its harsh desert environment in Namibia.

 

The beetle gets drinking water from fog which condenses on its back before trickling down to its mouth.

 

That provided the inspiration for fog-harvesting nets used in arid mountainous areas of Africa, South America and Asia, but Whisson believes his design has bigger potential.

 

Wind powers not only the blades, but also the refrigeration process. Although water can be produced in a breeze as gentle as 2km/h, stronger winds generate more power and therefore water. Even better, the hotter the temperature, the more water the air contains.

IOL: The windmill that produces water out of air

 

More here

WATER UN LIMITED - Potentially the world's first continuous source of water

Max Water News

 

30.05.07: The Max Water features on the 'saving water special' on ABC's 'The New Inventors'

 

22.05.07: Fantastic ABC 'Australian Story' documentary on inventor Max Whisson

 

15.03.07: Alternative Energy Sources online article

[Michaelangelica]

Air water harvesters Could have an important role reducing the greenhouse gas H2O too.

We could kill two birds with the one stone.

Earth getting steamier and steamier

Michael Kahn

Reuters

Thursday, 11 October 2007

raindrops

Warmer air holds more water vapour, a greenhouse that stokes the warming effect and so worsens humidity (Image: iStockphoto)

Greenhouse gases are making the earth's atmosphere wetter and stickier, which may lead to more powerful hurricanes, hotter temperatures and heavier rainfall in tropical regions, UK researchers report.

 

The findings, published today in the journal Nature, are some of the first to suggest how human-produced greenhouse gases have affected global humidity levels in recent decades.

 

The results could also offer clues on future climate change, the researchers say.

News in Science - Earth getting steamier and steamier - 11/10/2007

 

Could this technology be combined with air conditioning for domestic use?

the Air Water Pty Ltd's Air Water Machines also harvest water from air by using a condensation method. An example of the principle is the water you see on the ground under your car's air-conditioner, or the water in the bottom of your fridge: water from air!

 

These machines "pull air over a condenser, chill it and harvest the resulting water." Simple! Why did I not think of that!

 

This company's "Lifesaver" machine is the world’s first unique PV Solar Powered system that stands alone, in any place, 24/7, while producing huge amounts of water. The Lifesaver can provide water and power independence practically anywhere.

 

It produces 500 litres of water in 24 hours. It needs input power of 8.8KW and consumes 0.4kwH per litre of water produced.

 

See it in action here but make sure you enable your Firefox browser to play it, or use Internet Explorer.

 

It sells many different types of water from air harvesters,ranging from domestic use to that of a village!

 

The "Villager" produces 1000 litres per day (264 gallons) and the "Irrigator" an impressive 5000 litres (1321 gallons). At an estimated AUS 3c cents per litre this is still costly if using a diesel generator. But with wind or solar...

Water From Air - Using Salt

also more at

Conjuring Water From The Air | Robin Bloor

 

PS

from India

As part of the $93 million agreement, GE is providing Dynoil with 200-Watt solar modules and 5,000 water filtration units that are capable of providing 7.57 cubic meters (2,000 U.S. gallons) of water, or enough water to meet the daily requirements for 500 people. By utilizing GE’s solar-energy and water filtration technologies, Dynoil will be able to reach many remote and rural areas throughout India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Malaysia and Africa.

For more information on GE Water & Process Technologies, visit Water & Process Technologies: Water, wastewater and process systems solutions.

GE to Supply ecomagination Products for Dynoil's Alternative Energy Initiative

I wonder what a unit would cost?

 

More info here. very interesting

Electrodialysis Reversal (EDR)

 

Electrodialysis Reversal (EDR) is an electrochemical separation process that removes ions and other charged species from water and other fluids.

 

EDR uses small quantities of electricity to transport these species through membranes composed of ion exchange material to create a separate purified and concentrated stream.

Electrodialysis Reversal (EDR)

[Michaelangelica]

I would like someone to invent for me a domestic air water harvester, combined with a (preferably solar powered) air conditioner.

Any takers?

Any info on the WWW?

[freeztar]

They're called dehumidifiers and they have been around for a long time.

Dehumidifier - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Here are some models for sale:

Dehumidifier, Heating, Cooling Air, Industrial Supply, MRO items on eBay.com

 

SolarVenti SV2 SOLAR VENTILATION DEHUMIDIFIER HEATER SS - (eBay item 110176028037 end time Oct-30-07 16:50:25 PDT)

[HydrogenBond]

The best natural source of clean water is already setting itself up. It is called global warming. If the earth gets warmer, that means more water from the oceans will evaporate and end up in the atmosphere. This means the amount of drinking water produced by the sun will increase. The bigger storms are a good way to water down the poluted inland water so it can flow to the oceans for recycle. The water table is also replenished so the future will have a larger reservoir of good drinking water.

 

The warmer temperatures and the higher supply of rain water, then means that the plants will see a longer growing season and will be able to cover a larger percent of the earth's land. Plants help to fix water, so it can not evaporate as easily. Beside more fresh water, global warming by stimulating plant growth, will create more food. The fear of global warming is for the short term inconvenience, not the longer term benefits.

[Erasmus00]

The warmer temperatures and the higher supply of rain water, then means that the plants will see a longer growing season and will be able to cover a larger percent of the earth's land. Plants help to fix water, so it can not evaporate as easily. Beside more fresh water, global warming by stimulating plant growth, will create more food. The fear of global warming is for the short term inconvenience, not the longer term benefits.

 

Not really true, as far as food goes. Warming shifts the ideal growing latitude away from the equator, where much of the land is not suitable for farming (no topsoil). Less food, not more.

-Will

[freeztar]

The best natural source of clean water is already setting itself up. It is called global warming. If the earth gets warmer, that means more water from the oceans will evaporate and end up in the atmosphere. This means the amount of drinking water produced by the sun will increase. The bigger storms are a good way to water down the poluted inland water so it can flow to the oceans for recycle. The water table is also replenished so the future will have a larger reservoir of good drinking water.

 

It's important to note the difference between GW and climate change. Climate change allows for variability of climate locally. For example, areas that were once forests, might dry up to deserts and then flooding might occur elsewhere.

The warmer temperatures and the higher supply of rain water, then means that the plants will see a longer growing season and will be able to cover a larger percent of the earth's land. Plants help to fix water, so it can not evaporate as easily.

 

Plants do not help fix water. They do the opposite. Through a process known as transpiration (often combined with evaporation to become evapotranspiration), the plants make very efficient water producers effectively syphoning the moisture from the ground and releasing it into the air.

 

An acre of corn gives off about 3,000-4,000 gallons (11,400-15,100 liters) of water each day, and a large oak tree can transpire 40,000 gallons (151,000 liters) per year.

The Water Cycle: Evapotranspiration, from USGS Water Science for Schools

 

Beside more fresh water, global warming by stimulating plant growth, will create more food. The fear of global warming is for the short term inconvenience, not the longer term benefits.

 

On the global level, I think there will be far less fresh water available if we continue to see a climate shift with a warming trend (we already are). And as Erasmus pointed out, a warming trend would narrow the growing range for many crops.

[Cedars]

Not really true, as far as food goes. Warming shifts the ideal growing latitude away from the equator, where much of the land is not suitable for farming (no topsoil). Less food, not more.

-Will

 

I have always been under the impression much of the equatorial regions have very poor soils, such as the amazon area where farmland is basically useless (without huge amounts of ferts) after only a few years.

 

Global soil orders map:

http://www.in.nrcs.usda.gov/mlra11/images/Global_Soil_Orders_poster.JPG

 

As I understand good crop soils, the map above indicates these regions are shown in the greens (with some variables of course).

 

Much of the success of current crops is because of hybrid seeds allowing crops to be grown in regions whos climate doesnt support them currently, such as corn that ears out in 90 days rather than 120, dwarf wheats (which dont topple over in the winds) wheats with shorter growing seasons allowing second crops, etc. A longer growing season (warmer conditions) will increase the amount of lands that can support crops simply due to the massive amount of land which is too cold to farm our typical food crops.

[Cedars]

The water table is also replenished so the future will have a larger reservoir of good drinking water.

 

The water table needs sitting water to be able to soak down into the ground. With the massive drainage of wetlands that comes with development, I dont see any potential for increased reservoirs under the surface. Just more waters running back into the oceans.

[Cedars]

On the global level, I think there will be far less fresh water available if we continue to see a climate shift with a warming trend (we already are). And as Erasmus pointed out, a warming trend would narrow the growing range for many crops.

 

I agree about the less fresh water only because of the increase of human demands (via continued population growth) rather than an ill-effect of GW.

[Jet2]

What about simply combine Hydrogen and Oxygen?:)