A Desperate Measure ?
---------------------------
Gujarat
CM , Shri Vijay Rupani announced setting up of a Sea Water Desalination plant ,
costing Rs 1,000 crore
He
added :
"We will set up 7-8 plants along the
state's coast, which will help in making water crisis a thing of the past “
Read
:
Using
Reverse Osmosis technology , plant will produce 100 million liter of drinkable
water per day
At
what cost ?
My
guestimate :
Capital
Cost ……………………………….. Rs 1,000 cr
Interest
@ 15 % ………………………….. Rs 150 cr
Depreciation
@ 10 %..................... Rs 100 cr
Operating
Expenses @ 20 % ………… Rs 200 cr
----------------------------------------------------------
Total
annual cost …………………………… Rs 450 cr
Per
day cost ( 365 days ) ………………. Rs 1.23 cr ( Rs
12.3 Million )
So
, per liter cost …………………………… Rs 0.10 ( approx. )
Considering
that , by 2020 , we may expect “ Water
Wars “ in most metro cities of India , this measure may be justified
I
only hope , the Policy Makers took this huge investment decision ( which will
require 30 MONTHS
to supply water ) , after considering the following alternatives :
As far as India is
concerned , all that is required , is to dig 700,000
ponds /
lakes ( one in each village ) , where we capture / store rain water
These 700,000 ponds must be
lined with Geo-Synthetic Fabrics to ensure
that the
captured water does not seep underground - a simple technology
[
source : https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2016/04/water-wars.html
/ 08 April 2016
]
A device that can create water
out of thin air in even arid environments has been invented that
could make Coleridge’s famous line “Water, water, everywhere, Nor any drop to
drink” a thing of the past.
· Using only the power of the sun and a special material with some
extraordinary properties, the device is capable of producing 2.8 litres of water in 12 hours.
· And it can work in conditions where humidity
is as low as 20 per cent.
[
source ; https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2017/04/water-water-everywhere-even-in-latur.html
/ 15
April 2017 ]
Akshay Deshmukh [ akshay.deshmukh@yale.edu ]
Ref
:
· https://scholar.google.co.in/citations?user=SxKsRlUAAAAJ&hl=en
· https://elimelechlab.yale.edu/people/akshay-deshmukh
And
his work ( getting clean
water from dry desert air – using Solar energy ) is at :
Using Solar Power To Bring Clean Drinking Water To Remote
Areas
https://scienceblog.com/499980/using-solar-power-to-bring-clean-drinking-water-to-remote-areas/
It is very heartening that a
team of scientists have just come up with such a method
By draping
black, carbon-dipped paper in a triangular shape and using it to both absorb
and vaporize water, they have developed a method for using sunlight to generate clean water with near-perfect efficiency
Read about
this at :
[
source : https://myblogepage.blogspot.com/2018/05/clean-drinking-water.html
/ 05 May
2018 ]
Highlights :
They prevailed by developing
a system that uses shipping containers, wood chips and
other detritus to produce as much as 528 gallons ( 2,000
liters ) of water a day at a cost of no more
than 2 cents a quart (1 liter).
They settled on creating
little rainstorms inside shipping containers by heating
up wood chips to produce the temperature and humidity needed to
draw water from the air and the wood itself.
And if you don’t have wood
chips to heat them with, coconut husks, rice, walnut
shells, grass clippings or
just about any other such waste product will do just fine
Certainly
in regions where you have a lot of biomass this
is going to be a very simple technology to deploy,” said Matthew Stuber, a
professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at the University of
Connecticut and expert on water systems who was one of the panel’s judges.
He
called their water-making machine a “really cool” merging of rather simple technologies that can be used to
quickly deliver water to regions hit by natural disasters, stricken by drought
or even rural areas with a shortage of clean water.
26 Oct 2018 ]
Before
different coastal States of India , start spending lakhs of crore of rupees on
Desalination Plants , I urge Prime
Minister’s Science – Technology – Innovation Advisory Council to examine
the above mentioned alternatives , which score over those Desalination Plants
in following respects :
· Very
low initial capital cost ( could be 5 % of Desalination plant equivalent
units )
· Erection
/ commissioning within WEEKS ( instead of MONTHS )
· Solar
Energy powered ( no need for coal-based / polluting electricity )
· Thousands
of small units close to usage , eliminating piped distribution
· No
need to be only in coastal areas . Can be anywhere / even in a desert !
· None
( or very little running maintenance cost )
· No
need to replace Reverse Osmosis Filters ( very expensive )
· Will
solve the problem of Stubble burning / smog in Delhi
· Plants
can be easily fabricated by small , local workshops generating employment
On
many earlier occasions , I have said :
All
the problems of the World are known
For
each of these, practical / feasible solutions are also known
Only
NOT known are obsessed / dedicated / committed persons , who come forward to
say :
“
I will implement this and won’t let anyone derail me “
References :
Indian
Desalination Association
Is
desalination worth its salt ?
19
Nov 2018
www.hemenparekh.in / blogs
No comments:
Post a Comment