Strident Ltd.
Sustainable Development
The Need
In brief, world wide, especially in developed countries where the burgeoning population consumes natural resources the world need (deficit) for potable water is enormous and growing rapidly. As the population grows, the criticality increases. It is estimated that California will be in a critical state of affairs by 2015, and would be now if not for the efforts of municipal water districts and the Metropolitan Water District to reduce water use, as well as the canal system put in place in the 1970s.
Southern Australia has cities that have actually run out of water from time to time. The shift in weather is leaving England in a drought state. The problem affects roughly 60% of the world's population in one way or another.
The climate shift, if it is warming (we in San Diego have had a cold winter and spring in 2007), will result in lower water supplies to major cities as the population continues to grow. Why? Because warmer air means less snow, ergo, less snow pack, less snow melt during the spring and summers.
If the CO2 causing this is anthropogenic, then it is antilogical to then to use more fossil fuels to make the water, especially when there is a value added, and, frankly, much more affordable, natural, renewable, zero emissions desalination alternative.
Additionally, burning fossil fuels to power desalination plants is costly both to the consumer and to the environment. However, we have a different issue. We were recently contacted by the US DoE about carbon dioxide sequestration. When CO2 is injected into the ground high saline water come out of the ground with minerals salts derived from CO2 and the rocks receiving them. Calcium carboxylate, magnesium carboxylate, potassium carboxylate and other salts reaching 200,000ppm tds in this water results from the injection. We are likely the only people who can treat these waters.
Using Reverse Osmosis to desalt ocean water is enormously costly. Only the oil rich Arab countries can afford to burn oil for steam type desalination, and they are then consuming the limited fossil fuels that are their chief source of income. Trying to treat waters from carbon sequestration efforts virtually dissolves membranes. This is not the answer.
An economically viable system of creating high volumes of potable water is necessary for the continued economic development of many of the world’s key economic powers.
Because this system uses no membranes, it can be applied to special situations where investment in membranes is known to produce an impossible situation. See “Where” to the left for more information about these applications and why this system is so vital to continued economic growth in so much of the world. People need potable water to survive and for economies to grow. Investment in water is being called the "new gold" or the "new oil" as water becomes increasingly critical world wide. This will become more evident as the time domain continues ever forward. ~Adj. Professor Ronald A. Newcomb
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