Water and the Demand Problem
According to Rob McGinnis, by the year 2030 there will 40% less fresh water in the world than the world’s growing population will need. I remember in junior high school doing a project on water scarcity and learning that by the middle of the century peak water would have been reached. I came up with a system of using direct solar gain in a greenhouse to desalinate sea water as one solution to this problem, which has been projected worse and worse every year since then. McGinnis has come up with an even better solution. Through a process he calls forward osmosis, McGinnis has developed a system that manipulates the osmotic pressure phenomenon to super-salinate salt water in a way that can easily be undone resulting in fresh water. It is a simple and elegant solution that doesn’t require much energy input so is also a very climate friendly solution.
As he points out in the video, though, water scarcity is less about low supply as it is about high demand. Everything in our world that is coming up against or will be coming up against scarcity issues – water, energy, food – are doing so not because of lack of supply but because of out of control demand. With a global population that is growing exponentially, demand also grows exponentially. It is what led to the global economic crises of late. Exponentially growing populations result in exponentially growing demand for necessities, consumer goods, and luxuries alike. All of which require energy, water, and land to create.
Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/zachheller
While McGinnis’ plans to desalinate the oceans through low energy forward osmotic methods is commendable in its desires to not affect climate change through unnecessary fossil fuel usage, what sort of other side effects might it have? How would the climate be affected by so drastically altering the ratios of fresh and salt water in the water cycle? Would this make any difference at all? More importantly, though, how do we move beyond treating the supply symptoms of our systemic demand problem? What ideas do you have or have seen or heard recently that address these issues?
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