Teri Dankovich’s Drinkable Book: Reliable Safe Drinking Water For The World’s Poorest?

Will Terry Dankovich’s “Drinkable Book” finally solve the reliability problem of safe drinking water supply for the world’s poorest citizens?

By: Ringo Bones 

By last count, as many as 358-million people in sub-Saharan Africa do not have a reliable access to safe clean drinking water. The good news is researchers have just come up with a book on water safety whose very pages can be used to filter water to make it safe to drink. Results of the trials done in 25 contaminated water sites in South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, Haiti and Bangladesh showed that the said book, which contains tiny particles of copper and silver, could eliminate over 99-percent of disease-causing bacteria as stated in the results of the project unveiled at the American Chemical Society’s national meeting that began back in August 16, 2015.  

Teri Dankovich, from Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, who has been leading the research on what she calls “The Drinkable Book”, said in one trial that they tested a ditch contaminated with sewage that contained millions of disease-causing bacteria. Dankovich said: “even if highly contaminated water sources like the one we tested, we can achieve 99.9-percent purity with our silver-and-copper nanoparticle paper, bringing bacteria levels down comparable to those found in United States’ tap water”.  

Each paper of the pages in the Drinkable Book is embedded with silver and copper nanoparticles. The pages contain instructions in English and the local language the book is destined to. Water is poured and filtered through the pages themselves. One page can purify up to 100 liters – about 26 gallons – of water and one book can supply one person’s drinking water needs for about 4 years, the researchers said. The researchers currently make the books themselves – but are now looking to ramp up production and send the books to local communities.  

Microwave Heated Water: Deleterious To Houseplants?

Even though this curious assumption went viral once microwave ovens became a common household appliance, is microwave heated water deleterious to houseplants? 

By: Ringo Bones 

It is important to point out that water heated to a temperature of 70 to 100 degrees Celsius by whatever means – gas range electric oven, induction oven, microwave oven, etc. can kill any plant-life if poured at them at that temperature, this topic deals with the idea that water heated with a microwave oven to its boiling point can have a deleterious effect on houseplants after the microwave heated water is allowed to cool to ambient room temperature then used to water houseplants. Anyone with a working knowledge of homeopathy, the Peter W. Belt effect of polarized water in high fidelity audio and Rupert Sheldrake’s Morphic Resonance Theory will probably be very curious of the idea that microwave heated water having deleterious effects on houseplants whether or not their “preconceived science” behind their explanation of the phenomena seems suspect from the viewpoint of current mainstream science, they would, nonetheless, try this in a well-controlled experiment if their busy schedules will allow. 

Fortunately for those who might not have time to perform such a well-controlled science experiment first hand in order to find out if microwave heated water has a deleterious effect on household plants if used to water at them after it has cooled down to ambient room temperature, an episode of Mythbusters had performed such experiment and – inexplicably – the plants watered by microwave heated water has shown the most growth, Mythbusters’ Adam and Jamie were at a loss to explain their results and only suggested their fans to perform the same experiment to find out whether or not their results match theirs. Based on the Mythbusters’ experiment, Is microwave heated water be healthier for houseplants than either ordinary tap water and rainwater? 

Back in 2007, a Microwave heating system intended to be installed in the ballast tanks of bulk cargo ships and crude oil tankers to kill invasive organisms lurking in their ballast tank’s water that could have ecologically disastrous effects on the ships’ various ports-of-call became one of the years top inventions. Since the end of World War II, scientists have known that an average 250 ml. glass of tap water contains about 250-million bacteria and other microorganisms, could using microwaves to heat tap water then cooling it down to ambient room temperature to water it to houseplants be a healthier option to your houseplants because your microwave oven might have killed deleterious microorganisms present in tap water that could hinder the health and well being of your houseplants? 

To those with a “quirky phobia” with microwave radiation might beg to differ, their concerns over the deleterious effects of microwave radiation on living things does have “scientific credibility”. Even though the jury is still out on the link between deleterious health effects on urban dwellers on our current ambient microwave radiation exposure standards, everyone in the United States got neurotic on this very issue during the late 1980s and early 1990s when they found out that the then Soviet Union – once the socialist states’ occupational microwave radiation exposure standards became accessible by the West – has a more stringent microwave exposure guidelines in comparison to late 1980s era United States' OSHA microwave radiation exposure guidelines.     

Pseudomonas Syringae: Mother Nature’s Cloud Seeding Agents?

Even though the Bergeron-Findeisen theory of rain had been the widely accepted working principle on what causes rainfalls, is there another yet to be discovered mechanism behind precipitation? 

By: Ringo Bones 

Though this microorganism’s role in how rains form has just been discovered relatively recently, it may provide an explanation on why a rainforest or other regions on our planet is an inexplicable magnet for rainfall. Microbiologists and climatologists had just relatively recently found out that the microorganism Pseudomonas syringae that tends to hover above rainforests and other places with dense patches of vegetation has a protein structure that allows water vapor in the atmosphere to freeze just above zero degrees Celsius. The microorganisms themselves act as the nucleating agents that allow rain to form out of atmospheric water vapor that will trigger a rainfall if enough of them coalesce and the Earth’s gravity will do the rest. 

The working principle behind how rains form has been discovered by Swedish meteorologist Tor Bergeron in his white paper published back in 1935 proposing the astonishing theory that most rain begins as snow in the colder parts of the upper atmosphere. This theory was later elaborated by German physicist Walter Findeisen and is now widely accepted as the Bergeron-Findeisen theory of rain which is the working principle behind how rains form and artificial cloud-seeding. Dust blown up into the upper parts of our atmosphere where clouds form, ultrafine dry ice, silver iodide crystals, and even common table salt had been used in artificial cloud seeding with varying degrees of success. Now we can add Pseudomonas syringae to that list. 

Recent studies have shown that Pseudomonas syringae is a more potent nucleating agent for rain formation than dust or ultrafine solid carbon dioxide, silver iodide crystals and table salt. The microorganism has also been employed for awhile now as an ice or snow making bacteria to lower the operating costs of snow machines during the Yuletide season in places that normally don’t get snowfall during that time of the year.

Pseudomonas syringae is a rod-shaped, Gram-negative bacterium with polar flagella. Despite its desirable rainmaking and snowmaking properties Pseudomonas syringae is a potent plant pathogen. As a plant pathogen, it can infect a wide range of species and exists as over 50 pathovars seen as bacterial speck in tomatoes. Ice nucleation induced by Pseudomonas syringae that earned it the nickname the “rainmaking” or “snowmaking” bacteria – depending on the local prevailing atmospheric ambient temperature.     

Low Cost Fresh Water From Icebergs?

Even though plans to extract from one dates back to the 1950s, can Antarctic icebergs ever be a viable source of low cost fresh water? 

By: Ringo Bones 

Young Turks these days may have only heard of the scheme from a 2012 Dassault Systèmes advert often aired on the BBC but believe it or not, the idea of obtaining low cost fresh water from icebergs dates as far back as the 1950s. After complex logistical issues are taken into account do icebergs – as in Antarctic icebergs – really provide low cost drinking water for our increasingly thirsty civilization? 

During the 1950s, the US state of California’s number one community problem – and still probably is today – is where to get a low cost supply of fresh water fit for both domestic and industrial use. Back then, an oceanographer from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography named John Isaacs has suggested that icebergs be fetched up from the Antarctic to ease the state of California’s local water shortage. Even though the idea seems too fantastic at the time (and even for this day and age) – Isaacs’ colleagues from the Scripps Institution says not at all when they made the requisite mathematical calculations and found, somewhat to their astonishment, that it is the one dreamboat that might really float. 

Being formed from glaciers, icebergs are completely salt-free and unlike their smaller North Atlantic variety, Antarctic icebergs are big enough to make the idea worthwhile – as in economically viable. A good sized Antarctic iceberg is typically 10 miles long, half a mile wide and 600 feet thick can even be considered “small” when talking about Antarctic icebergs. 

Using 1950s era slide rules to crunch the numbers, the scientists of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography together with John Isaacs calculated that in two months time, three ocean-going tugboats could work a 10 mile long, half a mile wide iceberg drifting in the Antarctic into the Humboldt Current running up the west coast of South America. Where the Humboldt Current slows down off Peru and Ecuador, the tugboats would steer the icebergs into other favorable ocean currents that would lead it in a long, lateral loop almost to Hawaii and eventually to Los Angeles. 

Given that these favorable currents move at around 2 to 3 knots, the whole trip would take about a year and along the way the iceberg might lose as much as half of its vast bulk. But it would still represent about 300 billion gallons of fresh water. Authorities could ground the iceberg on an offshore shoal and surround it with a floating dam extending about 20 feet or so below the surface. This would keep the fresh water penned in around the iceberg as the ice melted. 

Because it is lighter, the fresh water would stay on top of the surrounding salt water and the city of Los Angeles could just pump it out as needed through pipes leading to the mainland. One iceberg that was originally 10 miles long when it was toed back from the Antarctic would be enough to supply the city’s then normal needs of fresh water for about a month – using 1950s water consumption figures. 

Back in the 1950s, the total cost of the water so delivered – mainly the then rate of one million US dollars for a year’s hire of the three ocean going tugboats – works out to be something like one-third of a US cent per thousand gallons, a minute fraction in comparison to what the city of Los Angeles pays back in the 1950s for its regular source of drinking water. Calculated to be financially feasible for California using 1950s prevailing costs, this method of “outsourcing” fresh water might still be appropriate for the water needy arid regions of the Southern Hemisphere – like South Africa, Australia and the Peruvian desert communities. 

Shanghai River Dead Pigs: Inauspicious World Water Day For 2013?

The timing could have been much worse but is the recent Shanghai pig carcasses in the river that number in the thousands a portent of our inability to manage our precious and dwindling fresh water resource? 

By: Ringo Bones 

Shanghai’s Huangpu River had recently gained global notoriety for the pig carcasses that on last count now had numbered 14,000 had been oft cited as an example of most government’s inability across the world to effectively manage their dwindling fresh water resource. And the pig carcass debacle could not have come much worse when back in March 22, 2013 we've just observed World Water Day. And many water supply watchdogs are increasingly concerned that most governments across the world are just too cavalier when it comes to formulating long-term plans to maintain the cleanliness of their main water supplies. 

Strange as it seems, Shanghai’s city officials say the river still meets national water quality standards. I mean how poor are their criteria for water quality standards can be when 14,000 pig carcasses strewn across the Huangpu River was deemed not a factor to downgrade the prevailing water quality standard of the said river? Clean water is not only vital in maintaining the health and well being of the populace but also vital for industrial and manufacturing activity as well. The powers that be also seem just too cavalier in their economic assessments when it comes to water supply security. By the way, we've been celebrating World Water Day since 1993.

As the world watches the “Shanghai River Pig Carcass Debacle” unfurl, authorities say they believe that many of the pigs came from the nearby city of Jiaxing in the Zhejiang Province where there are major pig farms. Many suspect that the thousands of pig carcasses strewn on the river is due to the government crackdown on pig farms back on November 2012 where a number of pig farms were ordered to be closed for using dead pig carcasses that died from sickness in making sausages and other processed meat products.   

Flash Distillation: The Most Energy Efficient Desalination Method That Was?

Before the advent of the discovery of an efficient polymer based membrane for reverse osmosis, was flash distillation the most energy efficient method of desalinating seawater during its heyday?

By: Ringo Bones

Back in the 1950s, when polymer-based membrane for use in an energy efficient reverse osmosis desalination plant use were still decades away, a way of converting seawater to potable freshwater called flash distillation was deemed the most energy efficient method of desalination at the time. But what makes Flash Distillation Desalination Plants so energy efficient compared to say merely distilling seawater at normal atmospheric pressure?

The boiling point of water – at 212 degrees Fahrenheit or 100 degrees Celsius – is largely determined by the prevailing atmospheric pressure of 1 atmosphere – or 14.7 pounds per square inch or 760mm of Hg at sea level.  At about 60,000 feet above sea level, where the prevailing atmospheric pressure is only 2 percent that at sea level, water now boils at human body temperature of 98 degrees Fahrenheit or 37 degrees Celsius – thus this is why we need pressure suits / space suits when we ascent at higher altitudes – and this is the working principle behind the flash distillation desalination system.

When superheated water enters a chamber at reduced pressure, the water flashes almost instantaneously into steam, this is the basis of flash distillation where seawater first enters the system in a pipe which forms coils as it passes through successive evaporating chambers. The pipe carries the water past a heating furnace where it is superheated (heated above boiling point without boiling it) to 250 degrees Fahrenheit. As the superheated seawater flows into and through the reduced pressure evaporators, each of the chambers is filled with steam. A steady inflow of seawater keep the coils cool and the resulting steam condenses on them and drips into drains that leads to storage tanks and since salt is not carried into the steam, the resulting condensation is fresh water while a briny residue many times saltier than the seawater is drained away.

Back in 1958, the city of Freeport in the US state of Texas was selected by the US government as the site to build an experimental flash distillation desalination plant to solve the chronic thirst of what then the city’s 11,800 inhabitants. Freeport got the priority because even the water obtained from the local artesian wells was deemed too salty for long-term consumption even though it is several times less salty than the seawater taken from the Gulf Coast.

Back then, it cost 1.2 million US dollars to build, the experimental Freeport Flash Distillation Plant uses extremely low pressures to cause water to boil, or “flash” almost instantaneously while leaving salt behind. And as a bonus, less energy is required - in the form of heating oil or natural gas – to convert the incoming seawater into steam. The method proved so efficient that Freeport’s first flash distillation desalination plant’s first batch of fresh water output produced had too little salt in it that the residents complained that what came out of their taps tasted too flat – almost akin to triply-distilled water used in a typical chemistry lab. To remedy the situation, the distilled water had to be mixed with the slightly “briny” water from Freeport’s local artesian wells so that some of its “taste” could be restored.

Back in the late 1950s, even the experts predict that within 20 years, flash distillation desalination plants located at critical spots will be producing up to 500 million gallons worth of potable freshwater a day, enough to supply even the largest cities. Well, this was way before reverse osmosis went industrial and there was even a nuclear fission powered flash distillation desalination plant being planned to supply the city of New York with low-cost freshwater during the critical summer months. How times have changed indeed.

Sun Powered Desalination Plants: Sill Workable Ancient Desalination Technology?

The ancient concept seems ingenious, but why doesn’t everyone use the free heat energy from the sun to desalinate seawater into drinking water anymore?

By: Ringo Bones

Believe it or not, the knowledge that salty seawater can be made into safe fresh drinkable water is more that 2,000 years old. Ancient Mediterranean sailors embarking on long seafaring voyages have supplemented their stores of shipboard drinkable fresh water by placing pots of seawater under the sun and trapping the condensed vapor. This very same technique – in an updated scaled-up form – had been tried in some large-scale experimental desalination plants back in the 1960s.

Surprisingly, the concept of using the sun’s free thermal energy to convert salty seawater to potable fresh water can easily work when scaled up to a several thousand-gallon-a-day capacity. Back in the 1960s, the 4,083 inhabitants of Symi, an island near Greece, used to get all of their potable fresh water from a newly constructed experimental solar-distillation unit which can supply about 4,000 gallons a day. It works by tapping the sun’s free thermal energy – i.e. heat – to turn seawater into fresh water by first piping seawater into a flat shallow trough enclosed under a transparent plastic dome. The sun’s heat causes the water to evaporate that re-condenses into chemically pure fresh water on the cooler underside of the dome. This pure salt-free water then trickles down the dome, drips into collecting trough at the edges of the unit and is then collected. The briny residue that’s left behind – which is several times saltier than seawater – is then flushed away back to the sea.

The method is very inexpensive given that the energy source used to desalinate the seawater is virtually free, unlike the more popular reverse osmosis method used today which uses electricity to pressurize seawater up to several thousand pounds per square inch to be squeezed though banks of salt-filtering polymer membranes. But using the sun’s free thermal or heat energy to convert seawater into drinkable fresh water is for all intents and purposes an inefficient and impractical process in most cases because the yield is quite low: at best only 0.13 gallons per square foot of basin area per day. This makes a typical solar thermal desalination plants that can be able to compete the output of a typical modern reverse osmosis desalination plant occupy a prohibitively large real estate for every gallon of fresh water produced.