Water Insecurity: These five cities could be one natural disaster away from a catastrophic water crisis September 2, 2023

 

Phillip Young, a resident from Jackson, Mississippi, takes a break while helping volunteers distribute bottles of water during the city's water infrastructure crisis on August 31, 2022.

These five cities could be one natural disaster away from a catastrophic water crisis

By Rachel Ramirez and Eric Levenson, CNN

Published 3:08 AM EDT, Sat September 2, 2023

CNN —  When torrential rainfall in August 2022 pushed the Pearl River in Mississippi to surge well beyond its banks, floodwaters spilled into the suburbs of Jackson and led an already-hobbled water treatment plant to fail. It was the final stroke in what experts described as a yearslong issue in the making, which eventually left tens of thousands of residents in the city without clean drinking water for weeks. What happened in Jackson, experts say, is a bellwether for what’s to come if America continues to kick the can down the road in addressing its aging and crumbling water infrastructure. The climate crisis threatens to make those issues even more pressing. When sea levels rise, summers become hotter or heavy rains lead to more flooding, the country’s water infrastructure – largely built last century and only designed to last roughly 75 years – will be more strained than ever, threatening a system vital to human life. At the rate our climate is changing, America’s water infrastructure is not equipped to handle the challenges to come, said Erik Olson, the senior strategic director for health and food with the National Resources Defense Council. “America’s water system relies on last century’s infrastructure that often can’t protect our health from hazardous contaminants,” Olson told CNN. “And our outdated system is completely unprepared for this century’s challenges of intense heat, drought and flooding.” The American Society of Civil Engineers gave America’s drinking water infrastructure a C-minus in its 2021 report card. And climate change-fueled extreme weather disasters promises a gauntlet of even tougher tests. The 2021 infrastructure legislation signed by President Joe Biden includes about $30 billion for drinking water, and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act another $550 million for water infrastructure. But experts say those figures are not enough to make up for decades of disinvestment and mismanagement across the country. In Jackson alone, it could cost $1 billion to $2 billion to repair the water system, and the water industry estimates that the total nationwide costs will top $1 trillion. “Federal investments account for just a few percent of the total needs,” Olson said. To better understand the issue, CNN examined five cities or regions across the country that show signs of vulnerability under a rapidly warming planet – from coastal flooding in New York to saltwater intrusion in California’s groundwater. Read more at this location for the additional story highlights on the following five major cities:   https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/02/us/water-infrastructure-failure-us-cities-climate/index.html  Buffalo, New York Prichard, Alabama St. Louis, Missouri Central Coast, California San Juan, Puerto Rico

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Water Wars: Avoiding North Africa’s First War for Water is the Subject of a New Better Satellite World Video from SSPI October 2022

BEMA International membership on land, sea, underwater, air, and space (The Final Frontier).

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https://www.sspi.org/cpages/water-wars

As our planet grows warmer, water grows scarcer in parts of the world that are already dry. In 2018, Cape Town, South Africa came within a few weeks of having its water taps run dry. According to NASA, the entire Middle East entered a drought in 1998 that, in some places, is the worst in nine centuries.

One of those places is Egypt, a desert nation that depends for most of its water on a single source: the Nile River. Nine nations draw from that river on its long journey to the coast of Egypt, which is last in line before the river meets the sea. So, it was with grave concern that Egypt watched Ethiopia begin building a massive dam in 2011 to generate electricity.

When Ethiopia began filling the dam’s huge reservoir in 2020, concern turned to alarm. Egypt demanded a promise that, if the rains failed, Ethiopia would keep the river flowing. In drastic need of electricity, Ethiopia refused to commit.

Would Ethiopia treat its downstream neighbor fairly if the rains fell short? Would Egypt, a military power, feel it had to act? The answers would determine if North Africa faced its first war for water.

But war has not broken out – because the nations found a way to let facts take the place of fears.

Ursa Space Satellite Imagery Prevented an African Water War

Observation satellites circle the Earth taking pictures of the entire planet every day. The images are used by governments but also by insurers, farms, forestry and other industries.

Some use radar instead of visible light. They beam radio waves at the ground and read the reflections. And those proved vital, because Ethiopia fills its dam’s reservoir during the summer rainy season. Cloud cover is heavy, but radio waves pass right through it.

Turning radar imagery into something decision-makers can rely on takes special expertise. For Egypt and Ethiopia, that came from a company called Ursa Space Systems. Engineers there measure changes in the size of the reservoir over time. Using that data, Ethiopia can prove it is managing water flows without endangering countries downstream. Egypt can check the same data whenever the flow of the river becomes a concern. And two nations with no other reason to fight can find better ways to resolve their differences.

Facts are not always the answer to fears. But satellite images and data – and the skills of companies like Ursa Space Systems – reveal more about our planet every day. As it keeps changing and we work to adapt, knowing the facts beats guessing them any day.

Ursa Space Systems is a U.S.-based satellite intelligence company that provides business and government decision-makers access to on-demand analytic solutions. Through its radar satellite network and data fusion expertise, Ursa Space detects real-time changes in the physical world to expand transparency. The company’s subscription and custom services enable clients to access satellite imagery and analytic results with no geographic, political, or weather-related limitations.

                                                     

Water Wars: Impending Water Wars: The U.S. ........ Nigeria: The Elusive Clean Water Dream December 2013

http://www.africanexecutive.com/modules/magazine/articles.php?article=7594&magazine=470




PERSPECTIVES

Nigeria: The Elusive Clean Water Dream

A Nigerian woman draws water                P. Courtesy

In the United States of America, the public water supply system is not listed on the stock exchange. However, water bottling companies are, but they obtain their water from public sources. Municipal water authorities run for and on operating cost with reserve allowance, and never for profit. They are revenue center for their cities but money generated is plugged back into the system.

Digging water boreholes is not water supply system. No city in Nigeria outside a small section of Abuja, has a sewer system, and wastewater component is annoyingly absent. The ‘shit’ of 160m Nigerians floats in open gutters, streams and creeks and in places that add to the stench. No one cares. The entire country is on septic tank, a public health hazard that adds to her challenges.

Nigeria has no system that accounts for junior water and senior water, classes of water considered in how to manage their flow. Therefore the borehole water and septic liquids are in tango. That is partly the reason why cholera cases are high in Nigeria. Prove me wrong. Were Nigeria to address her water needs in a system wide format, 60 to 70% of its public health challenges will go away or become manageable.

It takes 5 gallons of water to process a chicken. If a major chicken plant wants to consider Nigeria and has a daily chicken processing capacity of 1m, where will they get the water? Texas Instruments, a major micro-chip manufacturer headquartered in Dallas, uses 1.6b gallons of water annually; about 4.4m gallons daily.  Were they to consider Nigeria for a small plant, apart from power challenges, where would they get the water?

Yes, individuals have money in Nigeria but that will never rival institutional money which is the backbone of economic development. PIMP scenarios – “Put-In-My-Pocket” culture!! Even if every Nigerian is to be rewarded with their own oil well and handed $1m, chances are, it will not be a great country. It is not about the money, but structures, rule of law and master plan suited to address recurring challenges.

Of all the so called money bags in Nigeria, show me a village that is well developed as a result of their resource? None. Even Dangote, has no corporate headquarters worthy of mention. His village and state, may have mansions to show he is from there, but then what? Richard Akinloye, then NPN chair during Shagari, was first Nigerian since war ended that announced making/having a Billion Naira then, worth nearly $2b, in 1982. What happened to that money? Plenty of consumer wealth with no longevity often celebrated in less than a generation or decade. Ojukwu’s father, Sir Louis Odumegwu Ojukwu, was first West African noted as a ‘Millionaire.’ Today, where is proof?

Earning money is different from making money. Nigerians are happy making money and they do, but they hardly earn money. There is a world of economic difference between earning and making money, a subject of a doctoral studies.

I am available for extended and expanded commitment to enhance the franchise; God endorsing the plan. Failure even when it happens will be a prompt to do it again.

By Ejike E. Okpa II

Dallas, Texas.

Climate Change: Philippines plea: 'stop this climate madness' November 2013

Read More: http://www.unisdr.org/archive/35439

Philippines plea: 'stop this climate madness'

The devastation from super typhoon Haiyan has been both intense and widespread. Photo credit: OCHA

 

GENEVA, 11 November 2013 – The Philippines’ lead negotiator at the UN Climate Change Convention, whose home town was devastated by super typhoon Haiyan, told today’s conference opening that “disasters are never natural”. 

“We must stop calling events like these as natural disasters,” Mr Yeb Sano said in his address to the Convention's 19th Conference of the Parties in Warsaw. 

“It is not natural when people continue to struggle to eradicate poverty and pursue development and get battered by the onslaught of a monster storm. 

“Disasters are never natural. They are the intersection of factors other than physical. They are the accumulation of the constant breach of economic, social and environmental thresholds. 

“Most of the time disasters are a result of inequity and the poorest people of the world are at greatest risk because of their vulnerability and decades of maldevelopment.” 

Mr Sano said that super typhoon Haiyan was “a force too powerful” and was something that “perhaps no country has ever experienced before”. 

“The initial assessment shows that Haiyan left a wake of massive devastation that is unprecedented, unthinkable and horrific, affecting two-thirds of the Philippines,” Mr Sano told the Conference. 

“About half a million people are rendered homeless and there are scenes reminiscent of the aftermath of a tsunami, with a vast wasteland of mud and debris and dead bodies.” 

Mr Sano issued a stern challenge to skeptics: “To anyone who continues to deny the reality that is climate change, I dare you to get off your ivory tower and away from the comfort of your armchair. 

“Science tells us that simply climate change will mean more intense tropical storms. As the earth warms up, that would include the oceans. The energy that is stored in the waters off the Philippines will increase the intensity of typhoons and the trend we now see is that more destructive storms will be the new norm.” 

Mr Sano called for urgent action: “We may ask: ‘If not us, then who?’, ‘If not now, then when?’, ‘If not here in Warsaw, where?’ 

“What my country is going through as a result of this extreme climate event is madness. The climate crisis is madness. We can stop this madness. Right here in Warsaw.” 
Super typhoon Haiyan comes less than a year after typhoon Bopha, the Philippines’ previous costliest disaster and the one that had affected the most people.

Date:

11 Nov 2013

Sources:

• United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific (UNISDR AP)

Water Wars: Slingshot. Water Vapor Distillation System September 2013

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slingshot_%28water_vapor_distillation_system%29

Slingshot (water vapor distillation system)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Slingshot is a water purification device created by Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway PT.^[1] Powered by a stirling engine running on a combustible fuel source, it claims to be able to produce clean water from almost any source.^[2]

Kamen came to develop the device on the basis of statistics that showed lack of access to clean water as a key public health issue. Statistics from the World Health Organization show that there are 900 million people worldwide without a readily available supply of drinking water and that some 3.5 million people die annually because of diseases resulting from the consumption of unsanitary water. Despite the fact that over two-thirds of the Earth's surface is covered with water, only 1% of it is potable.^[3]

Kamen sought to develop a technology that would transform the 97% of water that is undrinkable into water that can be used and consumed on the spot, readily and inexpensively. The device takes contaminated water and runs it through a vapor compression distiller that produces clean water, producing 250 gallons daily (~946 litres), enough for 100 people. The test devices have been used with "anything that looks wet", including polluted river water, saline ocean water and raw sewage.^[3] In a demonstration at a technology conference in October 2004, Kamen ran his own urine through the machine and drank the clean water that came out.^[4]

By the end of 2000, a team of 200 at DEKA had produced 30 units, each the size of a compact refrigerator.^[4] A pair of Slingshot devices ran successfully for a month in a village in Honduras during the summer of 2006. While the initial devices cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, Kamen hopes that increased economies of scale will allow production machines to be made available for $2,000 each.^[3]

The Slingshot process operates by means of vapor compression distillation, requires no filters, and can operate using cow dung as fuel. In addition to producing drinkable water, the Slingshot also generates enough electricity to light 70 energy-efficient light bulbs.

Kamen hopes to seed thousands of the units with local village entrepreneurs, in much the same way independent cell phone businesses have thrived and gradually changed the face of many impoverished areas around the globe. Future target price for the device is in the $1,000 to $2,000 range. ^[5]

See also

• LifeStraw, designed by Vestergaard Frandsen
• LifeSaver bottle, designed by Michael Pritchard
• Tata Swach

References

1.      ^ Ulanoff, Lance. "Dean Kamen Honored by Popular Mechanics", PC Magazine, October 9, 2009. Accessed October 20, 2009.

2.      ^ Malnson, Donald. "Dean Kamen aims to clean water, generate electricity with Slingshot machine", Engadget, April 23, 2008. Accessed October 20, 2009.

3.      ^ ^{a b c} Bergeron, Ryan. "Segway inventor takes aim at thirst with Slingshot", CNN, September 11, 2009. Accessed October 18, 2009.

4.      ^ ^{a b} Pearson, Ryan. "Segway inventor drinks his own pee (really): Dean Kamen uses drama to test water-filter system.", Orange County Register, December 15, 2005. Accessed October 18, 2009.

5.      ^ Dean Kamen Unveils Slingshot, The Ultimate Water Regenerator, Impact Lab, April 22, 2008.

External links

• [1]
• Segway Creator Unveils His Next Act
• US Patent Application 2004/0159536
• Dean Kamen’s Slingshot water purifier and Stirling generator tech - low cost water and power for the developing world
• Thursday Mar 20 2008 Interview - Dean Kamen Episode: #04039
• To Build a Better World
• Segway inventor takes aim at thirst with Slingshot