what do you know,
here's one, right here..
California approves desalination plant as historic drought hits water supplies
so i was curious and began to read:
"California regulators this week approved a $140 million desalination plant that could convert up to 5 million gallons of seawater each day into drinking water."
hmmm...$140 million to build, so, i began to wonder what the facility costs to run, per day, how much energy, read that "Electricity", that unit will need, to convert 5 million gallons per day...i also wondered, what happens to the salt...so i began to read...
"could be functioning within the next five years"
"The state's Coastal Commission on Thursday voted 11-0 to approve"
"The megadrought gripping the Western U.S. has generated the driest two decades in the region in at least 1,200 years, and scientists say that human-caused climate change has fueled the conditions"
"address an anticipated loss of 10% of the state's water supply by 2040
"State regulators in May unanimously rejected a much larger $1.4 billion desalination plant, in Huntington Beach...citing the costs of the water, potential risks to marine life and hazards associated with sea level rise and flooding."
"officials have argued that the smaller Doheny plant will have an environmental design that better addresses potential damage to marine life."
i wanted to vomit
i got zero answers to my questions but i'm to understand, it's better to kill the environment in Doheny than at Huntington Beach
so, i hit the links:
Doheny Ocean Desalination Project
my questions: just the basic ones at that:
what the facility costs to run, per day, how much energy, read that "Electricity", that unit will need, to convert 5 million gallons per day...i also wondered, what happens to the salt...
"Unlike traditional desalination facilities, the Doheny facility would use advanced slant wells that protect marine life by drawing water from beneath the ocean floor."
"Built into the system being considered by the District is also an energy recovery process, resulting in 45 to 55 percent less energy usage than systems without that feature."
well now, here's some good news...that's gonna be interesting to keep that suction side silt free if you're drawing below the dirt level and saving energy while using energy to convert water which we have in abundance, that leaves more energy for them to water the fish in the delta more often, let 'em out to swim in the ocean for a while......someone should tell 'em to stop...i digress
i kept reading and here we go:
"After the ocean water is desalinated, the salty discharge would be diluted with ocean water through an existing pipeline – a process preferred by environmentalists and regulators."
so, we dilute the salt by adding it back in with the salty water...so, perhaps we can call this the "Catch and Release" program and soon, we'll be refiltering out that salt we filtered out last month
hmmmm...so i continued
"In 2018, the Final Environmental Impact Report was certified as part of the California Environmental Quality Act. State and federal permitting for the project is still underway with the goal to obtain all permits in 2022."
and i think, finally for this one:
"With a project of this scale, grants and low-interest funding are vital for project affordability.
To date, the District has secured more than $30 million in combined state and federal low-interest funding."
and, so, for four years, they've discussed this to the tune of how much from the taxpayers???(i did find out, so far, for that one report, about half a million dollars, not counting board salaries and room costs, podium costs, sheriff and security costs for all of their meetings) and we also find they're on a fundraising pitch to the tune of $110 million dollars...anyone believe governor greasy ain't gonna give it to 'em???
so far, one question answered, the salt issue, they just dump it back into the ocean which should one day condense into a cove or inside some harbor and kill all the baby seals without ever being touched by an angry clubber...how's that for excitement, but i digress,
my questions:
what the facility costs to run, per day,
how much energy, read that "Electricity", that unit will need, to convert 5 million gallons per day..
so i linked again
the official report talks about Mitigation in case they pump too much water, budgeting alone reads:
"Foundational Actions Funding Program – Advancement of Slant Well Technology and
Groundwater Flow and Solute Transport Modeling for the Doheny Ocean Desalination Project
Final Report 21-Mar-16
The total budget spent on the original contract was $375,991. Task 3 was over budget by $13,115 and
Task 6 was over by $4,315. Overall, the original contract is under budget by $4,289."
it's quite entailed with charts and graphs but no answers and i come to find out, these expenses were only for this particular report,
hmmmm
i would go on...but i'd just bore you to death
but let me finish this one with this:
If we can't charge our electric cars, where is the electricity gonna come from to operate this plant...here's a basic theoretical truth:
The theoretical absolute minimum amount of energy required by natural osmosis to desalinate average seawater is approximately 1 kilowatt-hour per cubic meter (kwh/m3) of water produced, or
3.8 kilowatt-hours per thousand gallons (kwh/kgal).
(edit: remember, they're talking about 5 million gallons per day - thousand to million: Add Three Zeros and 3.8 becomes 3800.0 kilowatt hours, we're now in the Mega Watt Range...yeah)
(edit, for comparison: How many kilowatts does it take to charge a Model 3 Tesla?
The Model 3 can charge at up to
11 kW (or 44 miles of rated range per hour) when connected to the wall connector.Jan 11, 2021)
we can't drive and soon we won't have any water at all, and we're gonna like that better than we have it today, but don't worry, there are more bad narratives out there, this one was simply a political piece for governor greasy: Look What I Can Do
Carry On because they're not done telling us stories...