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Thu, Mar 12, 2015
from Fusion:
Drop by drop: Living through the São Paulo water crisis
According to Sabesp, the Brazilian water company, residents of São Paulo -- more than 10 million people -- should expect five days a week of restrictions and only two days of full service. There was no date given for our access to be restored. If the situation gets worse, people from São Paulo will need to move to other parts of the nation with adequate water. I don't have a wife or kids yet, but this is difficult for everyone.
We are all worried we will become refugees.
Since October of 2014, I've suffered from water rationing. I know friends and other colleagues who've had these problems since September 2014. This shortage was not an accident, nor an act of God: this is a result of twenty years of government neglecting the ecological management of the water supply. ...
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Livin' la agua loca.
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Sat, Oct 18, 2014
from Wageningen University and Research Centre, via ScienceDaily:
Plastic nanoparticles also harm freshwater organisms
Organisms can be negatively affected by plastic nanoparticles, not just in the seas and oceans but in freshwater bodies too. These particles slow the growth of algae, cause deformities in water fleas and impede communication between small organisms and fish....
In the study into the effects of tiny plastic particles in freshwater, PhD candidate Ellen Besseling and student Bo Wang exposed water fleas to various nanoplastic concentrations. At higher concentrations, algae growth declined. Water fleas were also smaller following exposure to nanoplastics and their offspring malformed in various ways. 'These are the first malformations that have been seen in freshwater organisms and we do not yet know how big the problem really is', says Ellen Besseling. She believes that more research is needed into the sources, concentrations and effects of nanoplastic in water and on other organisms. ...
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"Microparticles" ought only to produce "microconcerns." Instead, I'm seeing "macroconcerns." What's up with that?
ApocaDoc
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Mon, Sep 3, 2012
from New Scientist:
Waste water harnessed to make electricity and plastics
TREATING waste water is energy intensive. In the US, it sucks up the equivalent output of four of the country's biggest power plants every year. But it needn't be such a drain on resources - soon it might be able to earn its keep.
A team led by Hong Liu from Oregon State University in Corvallis has plans for microbial fuel cells that will reclaim energy from waste water and produce around 2.87 watts per litre of waste water. That is almost double the amount of electrical power usual for such a cell.
And its by-products could be harnessed to create cheap, biodegradable plastics. ...
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I suggest we stop calling it waste water.
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Thu, Mar 1, 2012
from New Scientist:
No-waste circular economy is good business - ask China
For centuries the global economy has been linear. Companies extract resources from the environment, turn them into products and sell them to consumers - who eventually throw them out. As a result we are burning through Earth's natural resources and wasting useful materials.
But it doesn't have to be that way, says Felix Preston of think tank Chatham House in London. Instead, we could have a circular economy in which waste from one product is used in another. ...
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Next you'll be saying we should take pointers from Nature!
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Thu, Nov 10, 2011
from BBC:
Nigeria's plastic bottle house
Hundreds of people - including government officials and traditional leaders - have been coming to see how the walls are built in the round architectural shape popular in northern Nigeria.
The bottles, packed with sand, are placed on their side, one on top of the other and bound together with mud... Yahaya Ahmed of Nigeria's Development Association for Renewable Energies, estimates that a bottle house will cost one third of what a similar house made of concrete and bricks would cost.
It is also more durable.
"Compacted sand inside a bottle is nearly 20 times stronger than bricks," he says. "We are even intending to build a three-storey building." ...
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I'll drink to that!
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Wed, Aug 10, 2011
from Fast Company:
In Drought-Stricken Texas, They're Drinking Water Recycled From Urine
Would you drink recycled urine? Residents of Big Spring, Texas may not have a choice--the local water district is breaking ground this year on a $13 million treatment plant that will direct 2 million gallons per day of thoroughly cleaned sewage back into the regular water system. It's a practical solution for a drought-stricken state that is hunting for water wherever it can.
It's not as if wastewater recycling is a new idea. Texas has, in fact, used reclaimed water for over a century. But generally, the recycled water doesn't go to the tap; it's used in parks, golf courses, outdoor fountains, and more. The state has plenty of indirect sewage recycling plants--one of the newer plants filters wastewater through a wetland before sending it out to the facilities that want this so-called "raw water".
In contrast, the Big Spring plant will use sewage that has already gone through a traditional wastewater treatment plant, clean it out further, and combine it in a pipeline with lake water before sending it out to be used by residents in their sinks, toilets, and showers. This is, according to KDAF-TV, the first plant of its kind in the state--and one of the only plants like it in the country. ...
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Big Spring has sprung a leak!
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Wed, Sep 8, 2010
from EnvironmentalResearchWeb:
The rise and rise of water shortage
Over the past 2000 years, population increase has been four times more significant than climate change in the rise of water shortage. That's according to researchers from Finland and The Netherlands, who have analysed population growth, climate data and water-resource availability.... "Water shortage increased extremely rapidly from 1960 onward, with the proportion of the global population living under chronic water shortage increasing from 9 percent, or 280 million people, in 1960 to 35 percent (2,300 million) in 2005." "The pace of growth of water scarcity - which according to our analysis is very rapid in many geographically large and highly populated regions of the planet - is striking," said Kummu. ...
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Meet you at the deep end.
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Thu, May 13, 2010
from DC Bureau:
Poseidon's Desalinization Plant: Dream Water Supply or Draining the Pacific and Taxpayers?
...After 12 years of permitting battles, the [Poseidon] desalination plant - which could open the floodgates for many others on the California coast - may finally be built.
Best of all, the developers promise, it will cost the public nothing to build...
But dozens of interviews and a review of available records by the Public Education Center's DCBureau.org shows that while private equity and bonds would be used for upfront construction, southern Californians would pay at least $640 million over 30 years for the project, including as much as $374 million in public subsidies...But critics say that far from being a New Age answer to water woes, the plant and others like it are costly, unnecessary boondoggles that often malfunction and carry damaging environmental side effects. They argue keeping water prices artificially low through subsidies for costly desalination plants is the wrong approach, and that conservation, recycling wastewater, and other far cheaper alternatives should be tried first. ...
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Sounds like a Poseidon adventure waiting to happen.
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Wed, Apr 7, 2010
from American Chemical Society, via EurekAlert:
Household detergents, shampoos may form harmful substance in waste water
Scientists are reporting evidence that certain ingredients in shampoo, detergents and other household cleaning agents may be a source of precursor materials for formation of a suspected cancer-causing contaminant in water supplies that receive water from sewage treatment plants. The study sheds new light on possible environmental sources of this poorly understood water contaminant, called NDMA, which is of ongoing concern to health officials.... Although nitrosamines are found in a wide variety of sources -- including processed meats and tobacco smoke -- scientists know little about their precursors in water. Past studies with cosmetics have found that substances called quaternary amines, which are also ingredients in household cleaning agents, may play a role in the formation of nitrosamines.
Their laboratory research showed that when mixed with chloramine, some household cleaning products -- including shampoo, dishwashing detergent and laundry detergent - formed NDMA. The report notes that sewage treatment plants may remove some of quaternary amines that form NDMA. ...
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I suppose you'll say that elbow grease is dangerous too.
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Tue, Sep 29, 2009
from Florida Today:
Cocoa Beach plans sewage injection well
The city plans to inject up to 6 million gallons of treated sewage per day about 1,400 feet underground, then pump it back up later to water its golf course and residents' lawns. Officials say the well will enable the city to store more reclaimed water and no longer have to discharge the excess -- an estimated 300 million gallons per year -- into the Banana River.... Officials insist that the so-called "aquifer storage and recovery" wells are the safest, most affordable way to keep the nitrogen- and phosphorus-rich remnants of sewage from the Indian River Lagoon, where it can trigger excess algae and fish kills. But some environmentalists say pumping that kind of water underground threatens surrounding groundwater with viruses, endocrine disruptors and other trace contaminants that can linger after the sewage treatment process. ...
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Come on, you "environmentalists." We have to put our shit somewhere.
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Sat, Jul 11, 2009
from Portland Oregonian:
Oregon opens the tap wider for recycling gray water as demand grows, supplies wane
Oregonians have long recycled bottles, paper and cans.
But now water?
Yes, the estimated 40 gallons a day per person that drains from the shower, kitchen sink, washing machine. It is known as gray water, and all of it could water the lawn, the vegetable garden -- or go into the toilet tank for a "free" flush.
That's if Oregon, which faces a population surge in a time of uncertain water supplies, follows the example of water-starved cities such as Tucson, Ariz., which requires many new structures to be plumbed to make use of gray water. ...
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If only there was a more poetic term for "gray water"... muted silver water? smoky slate water?
ApocaDoc
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Tue, May 12, 2009
from Times of India:
The mad rush for water
KANPUR: The Khuranas leave bed early in the morning everyday at 5.00 this May, not to jog and gym, but to fill water as this is the only time it is
easily available. Ravi Khurana, head of family and a banker said, "The water supply has a steady flow in early morning hours so we wake up early to store enough water for our daily requirements."
Water has become a priced and elusive commodity in the concrete desert of this city and everybody can feel its shortage.
The problem increases in high-rise buildings. Along with rising mercury, family budgets too are rising with a new entrant in their household items -- water cans. Talking to TOI, Anupam Shukla, a resident of Swaroopnagar said, "Motor pumps are proving to be incapable of supplying water to our sixth floor apartment. Hence, we are forced to buy water cans of 20 litre capacity to store drinking water."
He added, "We do not use the water supplied directly for drinking purpose, rather using it for performing other household chores and for bathing etc." ...
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Can't someone just invent a way to make water? C'mon, innovators!
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Tue, Jan 27, 2009
from Functional Ecology, via EurekAlert:
Hoarding rainwater could 'dramatically' expand range of dengue-fever mosquito
[C]limate change and evolutionary change could act together to accelerate and expand the mosquito's range. But human behaviour -- in the form of storing water to cope with climate change -- is likely to have an even greater impact.... "The potential direct impact of climate on the distribution and abundance of Ae. aegypti is minor when compared to the potential effect of changed water-storage behaviour. In many Australian cities and towns, a major impact of climate change is reduced rainfall, resulting in a dramatic increase in domestic rainwater storage and other forms of water hoarding."
"Water tanks and other water storage vessels such as modified wheelie bins are potential breeding sites for this disease-bearing mosquito. Without due caution with water storage hygiene, this indirect effect of climate change via human adaptation could dramatically re-expand the mosquito's current range," he says. ...
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Maybe by then the rain will be so toxic that mosquito breeding will be curtailed...
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Want more context?
Try reading our book FREE online:
Humoring the Horror of the Converging Emergencies!
More fun than a barrel of jellyfish!
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Mon, Dec 22, 2008
from Riverside Press-Enterprise:
Inland researchers say storm runoff, once just a threat, is a resource to be managed
Two Inland researchers think they have come up with a way to help replenish depleted aquifers and reduce ocean pollution using some unlikely partners: big-box stores.
When it rains, much of parking-lot runoff flows across impervious surfaces into large detention basins, culverts or concrete waterways that carry the water to lakes and into the ocean.
The researchers propose tapping big-box stores, shopping malls and warehouses -- properties that generate much of the runoff -- to help capture some of it before it flows into storm drains.
They recommend building porous-pavement parking lots on the properties or channeling the storm water into infiltration trenches that allow the water to percolate into the ground.
Not only would these devices help reduce the amount of polluted water or "urban sludge" that ends up in lakes and in the ocean, it also would help recharge depleted groundwater basins, the researchers say. ...
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Now that's thinking outside the big box!
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Wed, Aug 20, 2008
from International Waste Water Institute, via ScienceDaily:
52-city Report Examines Use Of Wastewater In Urban Agriculture
As developing countries confront the first global food crisis since the 1970s as well as unprecedented water scarcity, a new 53-city survey conducted by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) indicates that most of those studied (80 percent) are using untreated or partially treated wastewater for agriculture. In over 70 percent of the cities studied, more than half of urban agricultural land is irrigated with wastewater that is either raw or diluted in streams. ...
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The swirl of the toilet
goes round and round.
ApocaDoc
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Thu, Aug 7, 2008
from San Diego Union-Tribune:
Desalination plant receives go-ahead
"private company's proposal to build the nation's largest drinking water desalination plant at Agua Hedionda Lagoon in Carlsbad cleared its final hurdles Wednesday before the California Coastal Commission... The $300 million plant envisioned by Poseidon Resources Inc. of Stamford, Conn., would produce 50 million gallons of drinking water each day, enough to supply 112,000 households." ...
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Now, if someone would only desalinize my potato chips I'd be in great shape!
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Mon, Mar 3, 2008
from Reuters:
Yemen Sleepwalks Into Water Nightmare
"BEIT HUJAIRA - Black-clad women trudge across a stony plateau in the Yemeni highlands to haul water in yellow plastic cans from wells that will soon dry up... These women are at the sharp end of what Yemen's water and environment minister describes as a collapse of national water resources so severe it cannot be reversed, only delayed at best...Yemen relies on groundwater, which nature cannot recharge fast enough to keep pace with a population of 22.4 million expanding by more than 3 percent a year. ...
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Three percent growth isn't all that bad -- but given the situation, ye men and ye women might want to give it some thought.
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Mon, Jan 21, 2008
from Living on Earth:
From toilet to tap
"Orange County will soon use purified wastewater to replenish sinking groundwater. Orange County, CA has opened what is likely the largest sewage purification plant for drinking water in the world. The community is on board, and the idea is already being copied elsewhere in the U.S. and abroad. 'The squeamish call it 'toilet to tap.' The correct term is 'indirect potable water reuse.' That's a mouthful. And in a few days 2.3 million people in Orange County California will begin quenching their thirst with it. Living on Earth's Ingrid Lobet reports.'" ...
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If we can start drinking our own urine, perhaps we can start breathing our own carbon monoxide and eating our own ... okay, I'll stop.
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