Comments on: Desalination With Small Electrical Fields — Simple New Method May Revolutionize Seawater Desalination

By: Nathan Rogers

Nathan Rogers — Fri, 31 Jan 2014 04:14:00 +0000

Then you are misunderstanding the terms used by the author. 25% desalination means that 25% of the salt was removed. In other words the water is still too salty to be drinkable by a long shot. 99% desalination means that 99% of the salt is removed bringing it down to a palatable usable level.

By: Orville

Orville — Thu, 01 Aug 2013 04:24:00 +0000

Bagging it too hard is a bit like looking at the Wright bros first flight and commenting “I can’t ever see it lifting a hundred tons and flying at 500 mph”.

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 22:25:00 +0000

A deep and expensive rabbit hole:

[High-quality drinking water and wastewater systems are essential to public health, business and quality of life. The American Water Works Association and others have documented that water and wastewater infrastructure in North America is aging and that many communities must significantly increase their levels of investment in its repair and rehabilitation to protect public health and safety and to maintain environmental standards.

Local role

AWWA believes the public is best served by water and wastewater systems that are self-sustaining through rates and other local charges. In 2005 the United States invested $84 billion to build, operate and maintain water and wastewater infrastructure, with more than 95 percent of those funds representing state and local monies without federal assistance or subsidies, according to the U.S. Conference of Mayors.]

http://www.awwa.org/legislation-regulation/issues/infrastructure-financing.aspx

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 04:20:00 +0000

I don’t buy water. But I notice that you can fill a gallon container at my grocery store for $0.10/gallon. 17 liters. 4.5 gallons. $0.45 per day. $164.25 per year. 60 year payback, assuming everything works without problem for 60 years.

I guess I could do the math with boutique water, but it seems pointless when one considers the amount produced.

4.5 gallons. That’s drinking, cooking and some careful dish washing for a family. A “gallon bucket” bath every few days.

No toilet flushes there. No laundry.

“All these pipes need upgrading and we don’t have the money.”

I feel like I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole….

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 03:56:00 +0000

I’m down to three times a week so I’m working on it. :>)
But, you know, you haven’t subtracted from your numbers what people now pay for plastic bottled water in plastic one, two and five gallon containers. That would all disappear. And at first people could just use their machines for drinking water. This uses a lot less energy than your numbers are pointing at.
Finally, our infrastructure has been given D to F by our own engineers. Do you think they are just talking about roads and bridges!!? Some of water pipes are over a century old (In Rutland they have some hallowed out logs in some places).
All these pipes need upgrading and we don’t have the money. I think evaporation and condensation is what the biosphere favors for moving water around this planet and we should do the same.

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 03:41:00 +0000

I can use my imagination. But I can’t dream up a large enough fantasy to make this approach work.

Close to $10k for 17 liters of water a day.

Time to return to the days of a weekly bath with all the family using the same tub full….

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 03:36:00 +0000

Bob, they are not mass produced now are they. No, I don’t have one. I just know that as long as you are not in a desert, you can reclaim water from the atmosphere and keep it pure with a germicidal UV light.
No more pipes, no more work crews digging for them or laying them, radically changed site preparation for houses along with less no city water purification plants using chemicals.
Use your imagination Bob. You sound like those people that say EV cars will never work because they cost too much. Shame on you.

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 03:30:00 +0000

Glad to be of service. :>)

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 03:01:00 +0000

I tried to check some facts on the device you’re hawking.

I found none. Just some testimonials, one from a person whom I know was fired from a major web site for making stuff up. No independent testing.

I rather doubt you’ve considered the cost of providing houses with $2,695 “water capturing from the atmosphere” devices and the 7 kW per day to run them. At $2/watt that would be another $3,000 or so.

The cost of repairing frozen water lines would certainly pale in comparison.

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 02:41:00 +0000

” I don’t have to give you chapter and verse. You’ve got google just like
I do. If you disagree with something anybody here writes, just research
it and challenge it.”

Got to say that brought a smile to my face. Considering all the time I spend backing up my comments.

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 02:30:00 +0000

You assume wrong. You can check my facts using google just like anybody else out there. Are getting lazy in your old age?
I’ll avoid caps from now on since that seems to get your drawers in a bunch. I’m surprised someone like you that has lived off grid hasn’t done the math on what is costs to provide a nationwide potable water pipe network and how unnecessary water generators in every home would make said network. The millions of dollars saved in avoiding fixing burst frozen water lines alone would be worth it. Instead of saying, “Hear, Hear!”, you come at me with some classroom professorial pseudo-erudite snark.

Have a nice day, PAL!

By: agelbert

agelbert — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 02:18:00 +0000

Here’s some “math” for you. I don’t write this stuff here just to read my words, Bob. These are comments, not articles. I don’t have to give you chapter and verse. You’ve got google just like I do. If you disagree with something anybody here writes, just research it and challenge it.

The Gulf is a small water body, it is more like a lake,” he said. “It is open to the ocean at the Strait of Hormuz, but because the opening is narrow, water is replaced once every eight to nine years.”

“Between the tankers, pollution from urban centres and the brine disposed from desalination plants, the Gulf is almost dead.” Because of its shallowness and the high evaporation rates in the hot summer season, the Gulf is one of the saltiest seas, and this is already a challenge for even the latest desalination technologies.

Read more: http://www.thenational.ae/news/uae-news/environment/desalination-threat-to-the-growing-gulf#ixzz2XqmK1bq7
Follow us: @TheNationalUAE on Twitter | thenational.ae on Facebook

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 18:41:00 +0000

I assume you’re low on facts.

You’re shouting.

By: agelbert

agelbert — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 18:28:00 +0000

The “blue gold” future water scarcity panic is just an excuse to try to jack up the price of potable water.

As long as people have a SMALL (it doesn’t need to be more than a few kW) solar panel , a water generator and a relative humidity above 30%, they WILL ALWAYS HAVE FRESH, POTABLE WATER.

Water generators are available for a family of four for about $1,000. AND, if they were mass produced like cars are, could be SO CHEAP that ALL PLUMBING INFRASTRUCTURE EVERYWHERE would be UNNECESSARY.

Scoff if you want. Just like individually distributed power in homes from PV or wind eliminates the need for a centralized power utility AND saves about 15% on energy from transmission line loses, individually distributed water generation would save BILLIONS in water pipes and treatment facilities. Same deal for sewage (distributed compost and fertilizer making in homes beats sewage treatment plants!).

“PURE WATER… FROM THE AIR!

The logical answer to the world’s fresh water crisis.”
http://www.aws-h2o.com/

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 18:17:00 +0000

What’s the math on that? How many gallons of water at what level of concentration are being returned? How large is the Persian Gulf and what is the water exchange rate?

I’m kinda thinking that the amounts here are not important.

By: agelbert

agelbert — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 18:11:00 +0000

Twenty five % desalination has a huge application right now! At present, the desalination plants along the Persian Gulf are causing over concentration of high salt % sea water where the plants are. This is killing sea life that requires a normal salt concentration in the sea water.. If they can use this method to treat the thick brine before it reaches the sea (and maybe harvest sea salt as a byproduct to sell), it could help the environment and pay for itself in salt exports.
All desalination plants should be required to NOT put high salt concentration brine in the ocean.

By: Sully

Sully — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 13:28:00 +0000

Well laminar flow theories definitely still apply even on a micro or nano scale – ‘Microfluidics.’ We always only hear about integrated circuits and new chips but there is plenty of research to develop microfluidic systems for things like drug delivery and now apparently water desalination. It’s just research done in a University…there’s quite a ways further to go.

By: Tahuaya Armijo

Tahuaya Armijo — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 11:54:00 +0000

Water, water, everywhere but not a drop to drink. The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere by Samuel Taylor Coleridge was on to something.
Lack of fresh water is a barrier to development and keeps many in poverty. This might not work out but I am thankful that many people are working on this problem. Someday, the problem will be solved.
By the way, Ancyent Marinere is not misspelled. That was the way it was originally written.

By: Rich

Rich — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 11:28:00 +0000

So……what are you trying to say……

By: BlueJay

BlueJay — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 09:50:00 +0000

There are a couple of problems here… first of all, 3V is twice the voltage needed to electrolytically decompose water into hydrogen and oxygen… and that means the method, right now, has an abysmally low thermodynamic efficiency. One would expect that a few hundred mV can get the trick done. This may require to reduce the size of the device by a factor of 10, though, which would reduce the flow by up to five orders of magnitude (I don’t know if the laminar flow theory for pipes applies to these small geometries, but I guess it does). And with that, the total throughput would be far to small.