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Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, but typically desalination plants are located in a single physical place, so a discharge pipe dumping brine 24x7 is bad for all of the things around it, as the local concentration is extremely high.
Seems like you could run a long perforated tube to diminish that effect.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like you could run a long perforated tube to diminish that effect.
And it doesn't even need to be a rigid pipe. A flexible pipe made out of, say, waterproof fabric, could be cheaply made to extend miles while remaining open due to the pressure of the water pumped into it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, but typically desalination plants are located in a single physical place, so a discharge pipe dumping brine 24x7 is bad for all of the things around it, as the local concentration is extremely high.
Seems like you could run a long perforated tube to diminish that effect.
...except for the huge piles of salt.
If the salt was not waste, surely people would already be extracting it from the brine and the existing methods would also be "without waste".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like you could run a long perforated tube to diminish that effect.
I liked the idea of loading it up on a ship that sails out releasing as it goes out and back. Make it solar powered or even go old school with literal sails.
Ships (with long submerged pipes) would be prone to weather events and generally less reliable than an installed pipe. Perforation would be prone to clogging from build up so a nonstarter I would expect. Adding flex tubing and a relocation robot would be a maintenance headache as well. Not sure there is an easy optimization.
> without waste ...except for the huge piles of salt. If the salt was not waste, surely people would already be extracting it from the brine and the existing methods would also be "without waste".
This reads like hyperbole: > The brine byproduct wreaks havoc on sea life when it’s deposited back into the ocean by raising the salt level and lowering oxygen in the water. Managing return of concentrated brine should be entirely tractable in the literal ocean.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like you could run a long perforated tube to diminish that effect.
I liked the idea of loading it up on a ship that sails out releasing as it goes out and back. Make it solar powered or even go old school with literal sails.