Limitless Fresh Water Lies Right OVER The Ocean - Without Desalination!

this video is sponsored by delete me as We  Know full and well here in California our planet is facing a freshwater crisis so the  need for innovative solutions is greater than   ever there are dozens of different approaches  to tackle this issue but what if I told you   there was a new way to get fresh water from the  ocean that is so elegant in its Simplicity and   so obvious that it's a wonder why no one has  thought of it before and guess what it's not   desalination it's a new Twist on atmospheric  water harvesting and today we're going to talk   about how it works and why it might be the next  big thing I'm Ricky and this is Two Bit da Vinci today almost 2 billion people worldwide that's  26 of the global population live without safely   managed drinking water and we're currently facing  the worst Mega drought in the last 1200 years here   in California now yes the recent rains here in  2023 have mitigated a lot of that but this cycle   will eventually continue in the future now if  you live anywhere on the Southwest coast I know   you felt this too but you've probably also felt  that if you live in some parts of Brazil a country   known for the Amazon the world's largest tropical  rainforest yet the Earth is almost covered in   water so what is the problem well there are two  sides to this issue the first is that most of the   Earth's water is in the oceans as salt water which  isn't drinkable there is an estimated 1.38 billion   square kilometers of water on Earth but only  2.5 percent of that is fresh water and almost 71   percent of that fresh water is Frozen in glaciers  at the polar ice caps leaving only 29.2 percent   some 10 cubic kilometers of fresh liquid drinking  water however over 99 of that liquid freshwater   is locked in underground reservoirs inaccessible  to us leaving only 0.92 percent of liquid water   in rivers and lakes for us to actually drink  this means we only have .0067 percent of the   total water on Earth available for consumption  slightly less if you discount polluted Waters   but even though this percentage is quite small it  still represents about 22 300 cubic miles or 93   000 cubic kilometers of fresh liquid easily  accessible drinking water or roughly 25   quadrillion gallons that's a lot of water to put  this in perspective the average person consumes   a little over 79 gallons of water per day at home  so the entire world population consumes around 228   trillion gallons of water per year so in total  in a whole year we use less than one percent of   the total available water supply at any given  moment and remember this is a renewable source   that replenishes itself through the water cycle  so there's plenty of water to go around even after   accounting for population growth which brings me  to the second issue population distribution you   see the problem isn't that there isn't enough  fresh water on Earth the problem is that water   isn't always where it needs to be because of  the way the population is distributed on earth   a good 2.3 billion people almost 30 percent  of the population lives in water stressed   countries according to the UN we even see the same  distribution problem within countries I mean look   at the U.S places like California and Arizona  House millions of people yet they're among the   driest states in the country water management and  recycling in places like Las Vegas have proven to   be successful and cut cutting down water usage  but this strategy is inherently limited by how   much water is available to begin with and isn't  sustainable in the long term as the population   grows take Las Vegas as an example the general  manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority   John Ensminger was once quoted saying that this  neon city is one of the most water efficient   cities in the world and that the city beat the  odds by cutting its overall water use by 26   percent while also adding 750 000 people to its  population since 2002 which is commendable but   it's obvious that it hasn't been enough since  about 10 percent of Las Vegas water comes from   groundwater aquifers and most of them are running  dry but before we get into that let me tell you   about a sponsor this week delete me delete me  is a hands-free subscription service that will   remove your personal information that's being  sold online delay means privacy experts remove   information from Google and 100 plus data Brokers  all year long get a privacy report in seven days   it'll remove your personal information like phone  and address it'll even monitor sites and repeat   removal as needed and users can even make custom  removal request I've been a customer for over   a month and I've recently received my first  quarterly report check out all the different   places where delete me has removed my data my name  and in some cases my address and other information   in some cases your data is removed right away but  other times data Brokers take up to six weeks but   delete me keeps track of it all and takes care of  everything automatically so stay a step ahead of   your privacy online get that extra Peace of Mind  of having a privacy Advocate on your side and save   20 on all plans with code Ricky with delete me  links in the description huge thanks to delete   me and you for supporting the show so besides  water management we must find additional sources   of water Israel is probably the world's best  example of pulling this off by combining Smart   Water Management and education with desalination  they've turned a water stress nation into a water   of surplus exporter in less than 20 years so  the question is why aren't desalination plants   everywhere this is exactly what I asked myself  about 10 months ago when I made this video that   I strongly recommend you watch at after this one  links in the description in short the problem is   desalination is very expensive and it produces  a concentrated salt water solution called brine   that is usually pumped back into the ocean where  it can wreak havoc by altering local salinity and   temperature on the ocean floor this raises several  important questions like why aren't salt companies   or lithium mining companies partnering with D cell  companies to extract valuable minerals from the   brine why is the brine treated as waste and not a  resource I did a bit of research and the answer is   as always cost although it is possible to extract  valuable minerals and compounds like sodium   hydroxide and hydrogen chloride which are widely  used in hundreds of Industries not to mention in   most toilet cleaners and in nearly all caustic  drain cleaners and oven degreasers it's more   expensive than traditional production methods as  long as there are cheaper alternatives out there   there will be little demand for brine byproducts  that said researchers from MIT have been working   on an economically viable product mix to make  brine a good and competitive source of certain   industrial chemicals so fingers crossed we still  have a big challenge to face if there's not enough   surface water not enough rain and we're draining  all of our underwater aquifers dry where do we   get fresh water for the millions of people that  live on coastal cities without desalinating the   oceans the answer as it turns out is all around  us we condense it out of thin air this is called   atmospheric water harvesting or generation AWG  for short now a small disclaimer I already made   a video about this a while ago where I explain  a couple of details in certain Technologies and   how companies like tsunami Works can help you  disconnect from the water utility grid with   their water condensers the bigger units being  able to pump out roughly 330 gallons of fresh   drinking water per day that's enough for a family  of four I'm hoping we can get our hands on one of   these and if we do we'll definitely make a video  about it but we're talking about an investment of   fifty thousand dollars for the bigger unit that  will last around 20 years producing 330 gallons   of water per day and that's just a lot of money  furthermore considering that the average U.S   household paid a little under fifty dollars a  month on their water bill although it's closer   to 100 here in California this means it would take  roughly 40 to 80 years for the investment to break   even and that's without counting the insane amount  of electricity these things consume which is close   to 11 kilowatts but if you're thinking sure but  a dependable and clean water supply is priceless   to that I would say you're right but there is  some bad news because some of these units might   not generate the stated 330 gallons of water per  day depending on humidity levels and the exact   climate where you live this is because this system  works by Cooling and compressing the air until it   reaches its dew point basically the point at  which the air becomes saturated with water   vapor and is forced to condense out but it only  works efficiently if you have really humid air   the problem is relative humidity which is how much  water vapor is in the air and compared to how much   it can hold it's the same Principle as a sponge  if the sponge is wet as in containing a lot of the   water that it can hold you'll have no trouble  bring water out of it but the sponge is just   lightly damp like in low relative humidity you can  squish all you want but very few drops of water   will actually come out so essentially the success  of a atmospheric water harvesting system is tied   to how humid the air is and we can't exactly  control that or can we a team of researchers   from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign  led by Dr Praveen Kumar afifa Rahman and francino   Dominguez just had the most amazing idea of how  to work around all the inherent challenges of   atmospheric water harvesting by using the ocean Dr  Kumar and his team's idea to capture and condense   humidity not from the dry air you'll find Inland  but rather from the very humid air directly above   the ocean's surface you see water will naturally  evaporate from and condense on the surface of any   body of water and if it's big enough it'll  come close to reaching an equilibrium where   air contains nearly as much water vapor as it can  hold at any given temperature this basically means   that the air directly above the ocean surface has  almost a hundred percent relative humidity which   is basically why you sweat evaporates more slowly  when you're at the beach this makes this ocean   Vapor ideal for atmospheric water harvesting their  design uses a large Tower as an air collector to   capture humid air from the ocean's surface and  pump it to a ground-based condenser that uses   energy to turn vapor into liquid water and then  pump to condensed fresh water which will already   be drinkable to your house with this simple but  powerful idea in mind the team of researchers set   out to find out exactly how much potential there  was behind harvesting Oceanic water vapor where   would the best places to put it be and how much  water could they really Harvest they proposed   building an offshore collector Tower 110 meters  tall and 200 meters wide they wanted to make it   really high to take advantage of higher horizontal  wind speeds at Greater Heights which increases the   flux of moisture through the tower to find out  exactly how much Vapor this surface could capture   they ran very detailed computer simulations using  hourly atmospheric climate data like temperature   pressure humidity and wind speed over the oceans  of the world focusing on 14 key Coastal locations   near large water stress populations like Los  Angeles Barcelona Tripoli Mecca and Perth among   others so I'd love to geek out about all the  calculations these guys have done to figure   out exactly how much water they could produce  because that's the kind of calculations I love   doing when I make these videos but the reality  is that'll get a little bit too complicated so   I'll just break down some of the key takeaways  below here's what they found across all 14 sites   around the world and averaging the last 30 years  of historical data each one meter wide 200 meter   tall vertical strip of ocean Vapor Tower surface  has the potential to capture between 0.6 and 1.45   million liters of water per day so the proposed  200 meter wide structure would be able to scoop   up 120 to 290 million liters of water per day  which is about 32 to 76 million gallons per day   that's enough water for 400 000 to 900 000 people  so to put that into perspective the LA Aqueduct   one of the biggest in the world receives around  524 million gallons of fresh water per day so   10 of these units could single-handedly cover  LA's entire water demand and most likely have   a surplus this table shows the numbers for the  other locations along with the number of units   we need to cover the entire City's demand Italy  had the lowest potential in the tyranian sea near   Rome with only 0.3 million liters per meter  of tower per day but even there it would only   require nine Towers to cover demand one of the  key findings was that unlike water sources and   arid places that tend to dry up even more during  Rising temperatures these higher temperatures   actually increase yield in the ocean water vapor  Towers since it increases the evaporation rate   so this is a great long-term solution that'll work  even better if scientists worst case scenarios are   ultimately realized so one thing I thought about  when deploying structures like this is what the   impact would be on the environment well these  200 meter collectors disrupt the normal water   cycle by tapping the water at the source will  they impact local or global weather patterns   and what about sea life and other considerations  well the team thought of this too because based   on their calculations and predictions this  wouldn't really have too much of an impact in   fact if we built collectors across all 14 study  locations they would extract 780 billion liters   of water annually but that would only amount to  .0015 percent of the total amount of water that   evaporates off the ocean each year the next thing  on your mind is probably cost how much will the   system cost to install maintain and run how long  will they last once the infrastructure is in place   thankfully Kumar and his team thought of this  and did some Financial feasibility studies as   well they assumed the cost of 500 million to build  the water infrastructure that will serve 500 000   users and 100 million for a renewable power plant  with solar and wind the system should last roughly   30 years for an annual cost per beneficiary of 67  so what this means is that the entire construction   project will only cost you as an end user sixty  seven dollars per year or about five dollars per   month operation and maintenance costs for the  lifetime of this project will contribute 78.3   percent of the total cost and will run you another  174 dollars annually so the total cost to your   annual water bill will be in the amount of around  241 dollars per year or twenty dollars per month   that's less than half the national average and a  quarter of the California average after 30 years   you'll have saved a minimum of around 11 000 and  a maximum of almost thirty thousand dollars so to   summarize this is cheaper than conventional water  much cheaper than desalination on its best day it   doesn't hurt the environment in any meaningful way  and if you power with solar and wind it would be   totally renewable if scalable without putting  extra stress on our traditional Water Supplies   of course there are still a ton of questions  regarding how exactly the tower will suck up and   pump the air why do they draw the air ducts over  water why don't we pipe them to shore underwater   the cold water could condense The Vapor inside  the pipe allowing for us to forego the entire   condensation unit what condensation system is best  suited for it what efficiency are we looking at   and how much of the vapor will actually be able to  condense out of the air despite the many questions   the moment I read about this which is published  in Nature's magazine scientific report just two   months ago I immediately knew these guys were  onto something this is exactly the type of idea   that really gets me excited about the future this  is just a theoretical paper and all the technical   details still have to be ironed out before it's  actually implemented as far as how long this might   actually take to reach final production there's  no reason to think that it'll take all that long   the technology is nothing new in fact it's just a  clever reimagining of air water generation systems   that are already being built today by companies  like tsunami works but by building them out on   the ocean we can take advantage of the fact that  there is a layer of very humid air right over our   oceans and that is a resource that is continually  being replenished as the sun comes up every day   this is one of those ideas that I love and  I think it could really be a slam dunk so   if you're an ambitious or clever inventor or  entrepreneur or engineer maybe this is one of   those projects that you might want to pick up on  because yes today we do have water and water is   still relatively cheap that's what makes funding  these kinds of projects difficult but there will   come a day when the water will slowly dry up  more and more and the prices for water will   go up we've seen this happen with natural gas  natural gas in America at least was seen as   such a cheap commodity that most homes use it  for cooking for heating for clothes drying all   sorts of applications but as the war on Ukraine  and other Global considerations have changed   that Dynamic and raised natural gas prices we're  rethinking that and that same thing will happen   with water yes it's not too late right now but  the best thing we can do is invest before it is   too late build these now and when the water prices  go up and the water aquifers start drying out we   could turn these systems on it's best not to wait  till it is too late to invest in this and that's   why we need need some cleverness and some people  with vision who can see into the future and build   these systems before we absolutely have to and I  think there's going to be a huge opportunity for   that all right that is a look at this video If You  Like Water topics I think you'll like this video   as well that we've made so check it out until  next week I'm Ricky and this is stupid DaVinci

Channel: Two Bit da Vinci

Views: 439,221

Keywords: two bit da vinci, Limitless Fresh Water Lies Right OVER The Ocean - Without Desalination!, desalination of seawater, fresh water, reverse osmosis, water availability, water filtration process, seawater desalination, water vapor towers, atmospheric water generator, atmospheric water generator project, atmospheric water harvesting, ocean awg, awg, ocean atmospheric water generation, fresh water generator, water crisis, desalination of water, desalination

Id: wt5xAcmfaYo

Length: 16min 31sec (991 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 30 2023