Water Crisis II: De-Salination

Now, as an update to an earlier blogg about the Water Crisis, where I suggested that there's really an awful lot of water about and much of it is found in the sea, I think I should highlight a few facts that were consequently brought to my attention. First of all, my suggestion that the government should simply process sea-water by taking out all the nastiness, scum, salt and small children, may have been a little unrealistic. It's a nice idea. But there is a problem - an environmental one at that. Apparently it takes an awful lot of energy to remove salt from water. Like fluff on velcro, it just does not want to shift. Well, not very much.  

Here's the bare bones of it:

Taking water from the sea and refining it for drinking seems like a jolly nice, environmentally friendly idea.

It isn't.

There is a huge irony - which, if you remember your Blackadder, you will recall is, "a bit like goldy and bronzy, only it's made out of iron". The huge amount of energy required to remove salt comes from power stations fuelled by gas, nuclear power, and so on. Power stations give out greenhouse gases which heat up the planet. Greenhouse gases cause the world to warm up, and your Gardeners' Delight tomatoes to grow into huge mutant things, promising to take over the world. But forget about the tommies for now. They're not strictly relevant. As the planet warms up, even more of the ice caps melt. These become part of the sea, meaning that what was fresh water has now become salt water.

And now there's even less fresh water.

More water. Less land. No hose-pipes. More bricks in cisterns.

Thankfully though, by this point there will be less people needing water, as East Anglia and much of Thames Water's catchment area will be underwater.

And there you have it. Thanks to the highly esteemed Mr S. Churchett of Southampton for bringing this to my attention. Your Blue Peter badge will be sent to you at the earliest opportunity, with which you will be able to gain free entry into several exciting things.

Or you can just do what everyone else does and flog it on ebay.