Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

desertsun.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 347 posts

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#61

Post by rr808 »

kickout wrote: post #56
rr808 wrote: post #54

Bear in mind that solar power is the future of energy - and the Western half of the USA will be the best place for that. Perhaps electricity for water is a fair swap? I dont like in general enabling people to live wasteful lives, but at the same time I feel like we've given up on big engineering projects. Most of the infrastructure we enjoy using in the US and other countries was built 100 years ago. Railway lines, b…

Quoted post unavailable.

Desalination is great for California. Arizona, Colorado is too far from the coast.

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#62

Post by dsr3 »

As a reference, China has been doing this a similar project to interconnect the North (think Beijing etc) and South (think Shanghai) water system. Heck, they have been doing it since hundreds of year ago [2]. So I guess there is a precedent.

Based on this thread, I would guess that a large amount of the problem will not be an engineering one, but political and social one. Constructing such a large mega project to divert would require a national unity and tremendous will to 'sculpt' nature.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South%E2%80%93North_Water_Tran... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Yunnan_Water_Diversion... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Canal_(China)

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#63

Post by exabrial »

This just makes me shake my head. I'm not in the industry, but I'm guessing there's a least a bunch of things that could destroy the ecosystem out west by introducing a different ph, foreign mineral content, or lack of natural bacterial content. So instead I have a bunch of better ideas that don't result in ecological disasters:

* How about people stop living the desert? Somehow, unexpectedly, there's not a lot of water there.

* How about we don't grow baby spinach 365 days a year? We can eat other things in the winter.

* How about we reexamine the scientifically unsound pact around the Colorado river?

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#64

Post by happyopossum »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #14

We can do without the water. If the country could do without the crops. As a Californian, I don't mind. But I have ran across some people who simultaneously think we need to keep growing, but, refuse to consider the idea of helping us with our water problem. It isn't a California problem. One way or another, it's a USA problem. Food or water. Pick your poison.

The proposal wouldn’t really provide water to California - this is about Nevada, Arizona, Utah, and the Colorado river.

I suppose some of that water could also be diverted for use in California, but that’s not what the author is asking for.

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#67

Post by [deleted] »

exabrial wrote: post #63

This just makes me shake my head. I'm not in the industry, but I'm guessing there's a least a bunch of things that could destroy the ecosystem out west by introducing a different ph, foreign mineral content, or lack of natural bacterial content. So instead I have a bunch of better ideas that don't result in ecological disasters: * How about people stop living the desert? Somehow, unexpectedly, there's not a lot of wa…

[deleted]

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#68

Post by _8j50 »

jvanderbot wrote: post #22

This is the worst take that I can't avoid hearing about. How does one build a canal that moves water uphill for 1500 miles across the continental divide in these quantities? If not a canal, then how do we do it? Pipes? We're talking a million cubic feet per second in the Colorado river during high times, which has been completely drained and diverted by communities downstream. The keystone pipeline carries 50 cubic f…

How? You investigate and research!

Tunnels, alternate locations,using solar and wind to generate pump power and once operational, using a dam to supplement the pump with hydroelectric power.

I mean, this is one challenging area where the best and brightest should be well funded to come up with a solution instead of writing them off.

Desalination is not a dream either.

People are fine to talk about colonizing other planets but are so dismissive of acheivable goals like this.

Trillions are spent on wars, a fraction of that can be used to desalinate water or create artificial rivers and tunnels to fill up artificial lakes.

My idea personally has been to build in parallel to the interstar highways and complement it with high speed railways and artificial rivers. The resulting econominc boom will pay for the cost and you don't need to print money, it can be bonded because you charge for the infrasteucture usage (train,power,car charger and water fees).

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#69

Post by jahewson »

jb510 wrote: post #35
kickout wrote: post #5

Please stay away from our water. I want no part in helping California become more unsustainable. ETA: to westerners- You have enough water to maintain first class lifestyles. Allocate/ration it better or cap population. Stop stealing from others.

80% of water in California is used by agriculture, we’ll stop “stealing” water when you all stop “stealing” Cattle and Dairy, Almonds, Grapes, Lettuce, Strawberries, Tomatoes, and more a that we grow with water. Unless you’d rather buy that all shipped in from South America instead….

Yep! 5th largest producer of food in the world.

Re: Time for Army Corps of Engineers to investigate moving water West?

#70

Post by [deleted] »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #14

We can do without the water. If the country could do without the crops. As a Californian, I don't mind. But I have ran across some people who simultaneously think we need to keep growing, but, refuse to consider the idea of helping us with our water problem. It isn't a California problem. One way or another, it's a USA problem. Food or water. Pick your poison.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN