7 ms·

I think the problem of salt is a much bigger problem than we realize it. It's toxic, you can't burn it for fuel, and you can't really do anything with it except

I think the problem of salt is a much bigger problem than we realize it. It's toxic, you can't burn it for fuel, and you can't really do anything with it except store it. Are there other ways of disposing of salt without repercussions?

unchocked 8y ago
If only there was a large body of water nearby in which it could be diluted...
- theothermkn 8y ago
  From the fine article: > But a less chattered-about problem is the effect on the local environment: The primary byproduct of desal is brine, which facilities pump back out to sea. The stuff sinks to the seafloor and wreaks havoc on ecosystems, cratering oxygen levels and spiking salt content.
- loco5niner 8y ago
  The problem is that is where it currently goes... It is addressed in the article.
ucaetano 8y ago
Yes: sell it. Or dilute it. The solution to pollution is dilution.
- gameswithgo 8y ago
  >The solution to pollution is dilution. For a while. The scale of human population and our increased per capita resource usage starts to make that less often viable.
  - gizmo686 8y ago
    Not for brine. The salt comes from the ocean in the first place, and the water returns to the ocean relativly quickly. Unless something changes and we start to notably change the volume of water in the ocean, dilution is the only way to maintain the ocean chemistry. If we don't, then we would be reducing the salinity as the water returns without the salt.
    - Klathmon 8y ago
      (as a disclosure, i've only read a very small amount about these problems, so please take all of this with a grain of... salt) The problem is that it isn't perfectly diluting, it's concentrating the salt in areas near the desalination plants, changing ecosystems and causing problems locally. There's also the semi-related problem of salt that isn't from the ocean making it's way there, increasing the overall salt concentrations over time. If we could find a way to use the salt from desalination (at least partially) somewhere else, then maybe we could help offset the "saltification" of the ocean and can more easily avoid destroying ecosystems around desalination plants. (it doesn't need to be an all-or-nothing solution, we could still dump some salt back into the ocean while keeping some out and used in other areas)
    - gwbas1c 8y ago
      I suspect that diluting the brine has problems that weren't discussed. For example, it might consume much more energy than we think.
      - cimmanom 8y ago
        Also, what do you dilute it with other than... fresh(er) water?
        petecox 8y ago
        Combine brine processing with sewage treatment? There's ample non-potable water whenever someone flushes the toilet, I would surmise.
cinquemb 8y ago
It could be put to use for CSP or nuclear systems that leverages molten salt for hex with water with some processing.
s0rce 8y ago
Salt build up in agricultural soil seems like a looming problem but I'm not seeing a huge issue with the salt from desalination. Can't we continue to dilute and put the brine back in the ocean? Is it ideal, probably not, is it better than rerouting rivers and depleting aquifers, probably.
- mikelyons 8y ago
  The pattern with human activity is that anything less than ideal will eventually kill us.
- rtkwe 8y ago
  FTA: > The primary byproduct of desal is brine, which facilities pump back out to sea. The stuff sinks to the seafloor and wreaks havoc on ecosystems, cratering oxygen levels and spiking salt content. The issue is the dissolution process is slow enough that the salt has time to wreck havoc on the environment. And if you're taking river water or aquifer water to dilute the brine to a point near the local salinity why go through the whole desalination process to start with instead of using the water to dilute this byproduct? It's easy to forget that at large scales the ocean doesn't really disperse things evenly. Surface salinity for example ranges from 30-40 g/kg across the surface of the ocean. https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/styles/full_width_feature/public/images/591162main_pia14786-43_full.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/styles/full_width_f...
jartelt 8y ago
I think it's most likely that it would just get buried or piled up somewhere. Salt is not really a high value product, so I wouldn't be surprised if desal plants had to pay people to take the salt from them.
- wuschel 8y ago
  * Problem 1: It gets into the ground water. * Problem 2: If dumped into the ocean, it increases the salt concentration (see: Middle East). Disclaimer: Worked on some related projects on how to find a positive use for Brine.
  - nightbrawler 8y ago
    Did you arrive at any possible positive uses for Brine?
    - wuschel 8y ago
      I wish we had. No, our team failed to come up with anything that would mitigate the hazardous effects of brine. The scale of brine production is enormous. While there are inefficiencies in the supply chain (energy carrier for reverse osmosis, membrane quality and technologies), we closed the project with the insight we are actively deploying another technology that messes up our planet.
  - khafra 8y ago
    What about molten sodium energy storage?
    - wuschel 8y ago
      We looked very briefly into energy storage and resource production (mining). The scale is the problem. At the end, you still end up with lots and lots of inorganic material, which is toxic for the environment.
    - jartelt 8y ago
      The amount of salt used in storage applications would likely not even make a dent in the amount of salt produced by large scale desalination.
shagmin 8y ago
I wonder given enough cheap salt, is there a possibility of it being useful for something? Like at least a cheap building material for desalination plants in areas where the deserts meet the coast, and the lack of rain would make it last longer or something. Or (this might seem crazy) considering Antarctic sea ice is melting at increasingly faster rates, which isn't good in itself - is that causing the water at the far south latitudes to be lacking in salinity? Would additional salt there provide for keeping the ecosystems stable for longer at least? Granted shipping would be another issue. The former may require some free market ingenuity, the latter may require some ingenuity and some sort of goodwill on the part of some governments.
- cimmanom 8y ago
  Himalayan salt lamps?
- elialbert 8y ago
  there's a fun kim stanley robinson book gaming out climate change (called 50 degrees below, or in that series anyway) where they dump a ton of extra salt in the ocean near there for that exact reason. In the book, iirc, it sorta stalls some bad stuff from happening but doesn't end up being that helpful long term.
strainer 8y ago
Salt is not toxic in all respects - salt lakes and rock formations have been natural environments in themselves, which have been present and integrated with more common ecosystems throughout natural history. The challenge is how to understand and work with natural ecosystems well enough to not burden them with salt concentrations that harm them, and perhaps even to fit and enrich them.
sunstone 8y ago
The sun desalinates almost all the rain that falls to earth everyday from the oceans.
ticviking 8y ago
This site is a bit more radical in how they go about it, but I know that in Utah we have several structures build from salt quarried nearby(huge deposits near the Salt Lake) and then treated to be water resistant. I imagine a similar thing is possible but maybe not efficient. http://buildingwithseawater.com/?myportfoliotype=the-salt-building-block http://buildingwithseawater.com/?myportfoliotype=the-salt-bu...
cwkoss 8y ago
Form it into bricks and build things with it?

unchocked 8y ago

If only there was a large body of water nearby in which it could be diluted...

theothermkn 8y ago
From the fine article: > But a less chattered-about problem is the effect on the local environment: The primary byproduct of desal is brine, which facilities pump back out to sea. The stuff sinks to the seafloor and wreaks havoc on ecosystems, cratering oxygen levels and spiking salt content.
loco5niner 8y ago
The problem is that is where it currently goes... It is addressed in the article.

ucaetano 8y ago

Yes: sell it. Or dilute it. The solution to pollution is dilution.

gameswithgo 8y ago
>The solution to pollution is dilution. For a while. The scale of human population and our increased per capita resource usage starts to make that less often viable.
- gizmo686 8y ago
  Not for brine. The salt comes from the ocean in the first place, and the water returns to the ocean relativly quickly. Unless something changes and we start to notably change the volume of water in the ocean, dilution is the only way to maintain the ocean chemistry. If we don't, then we would be reducing the salinity as the water returns without the salt.
  - Klathmon 8y ago
    (as a disclosure, i've only read a very small amount about these problems, so please take all of this with a grain of... salt) The problem is that it isn't perfectly diluting, it's concentrating the salt in areas near the desalination plants, changing ecosystems and causing problems locally. There's also the semi-related problem of salt that isn't from the ocean making it's way there, increasing the overall salt concentrations over time. If we could find a way to use the salt from desalination (at least partially) somewhere else, then maybe we could help offset the "saltification" of the ocean and can more easily avoid destroying ecosystems around desalination plants. (it doesn't need to be an all-or-nothing solution, we could still dump some salt back into the ocean while keeping some out and used in other areas)
  - gwbas1c 8y ago
    I suspect that diluting the brine has problems that weren't discussed. For example, it might consume much more energy than we think.
    - cimmanom 8y ago
      Also, what do you dilute it with other than... fresh(er) water?
      - petecox 8y ago
        Combine brine processing with sewage treatment? There's ample non-potable water whenever someone flushes the toilet, I would surmise.

cinquemb 8y ago

It could be put to use for CSP or nuclear systems that leverages molten salt for hex with water with some processing.

s0rce 8y ago

Salt build up in agricultural soil seems like a looming problem but I'm not seeing a huge issue with the salt from desalination. Can't we continue to dilute and put the brine back in the ocean? Is it ideal, probably not, is it better than rerouting rivers and depleting aquifers, probably.

mikelyons 8y ago
The pattern with human activity is that anything less than ideal will eventually kill us.
rtkwe 8y ago
FTA: > The primary byproduct of desal is brine, which facilities pump back out to sea. The stuff sinks to the seafloor and wreaks havoc on ecosystems, cratering oxygen levels and spiking salt content. The issue is the dissolution process is slow enough that the salt has time to wreck havoc on the environment. And if you're taking river water or aquifer water to dilute the brine to a point near the local salinity why go through the whole desalination process to start with instead of using the water to dilute this byproduct? It's easy to forget that at large scales the ocean doesn't really disperse things evenly. Surface salinity for example ranges from 30-40 g/kg across the surface of the ocean. https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/styles/full_width_feature/public/images/591162main_pia14786-43_full.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/styles/full_width_f...

jartelt 8y ago

I think it's most likely that it would just get buried or piled up somewhere. Salt is not really a high value product, so I wouldn't be surprised if desal plants had to pay people to take the salt from them.

wuschel 8y ago
* Problem 1: It gets into the ground water. * Problem 2: If dumped into the ocean, it increases the salt concentration (see: Middle East). Disclaimer: Worked on some related projects on how to find a positive use for Brine.
- nightbrawler 8y ago
  Did you arrive at any possible positive uses for Brine?
  - wuschel 8y ago
    I wish we had. No, our team failed to come up with anything that would mitigate the hazardous effects of brine. The scale of brine production is enormous. While there are inefficiencies in the supply chain (energy carrier for reverse osmosis, membrane quality and technologies), we closed the project with the insight we are actively deploying another technology that messes up our planet.
- khafra 8y ago
  What about molten sodium energy storage?
  - wuschel 8y ago
    We looked very briefly into energy storage and resource production (mining). The scale is the problem. At the end, you still end up with lots and lots of inorganic material, which is toxic for the environment.
  - jartelt 8y ago
    The amount of salt used in storage applications would likely not even make a dent in the amount of salt produced by large scale desalination.

shagmin 8y ago

I wonder given enough cheap salt, is there a possibility of it being useful for something? Like at least a cheap building material for desalination plants in areas where the deserts meet the coast, and the lack of rain would make it last longer or something. Or (this might seem crazy) considering Antarctic sea ice is melting at increasingly faster rates, which isn't good in itself - is that causing the water at the far south latitudes to be lacking in salinity? Would additional salt there provide for keeping the ecosystems stable for longer at least? Granted shipping would be another issue. The former may require some free market ingenuity, the latter may require some ingenuity and some sort of goodwill on the part of some governments.

cimmanom 8y ago
Himalayan salt lamps?
elialbert 8y ago
there's a fun kim stanley robinson book gaming out climate change (called 50 degrees below, or in that series anyway) where they dump a ton of extra salt in the ocean near there for that exact reason. In the book, iirc, it sorta stalls some bad stuff from happening but doesn't end up being that helpful long term.

strainer 8y ago

Salt is not toxic in all respects - salt lakes and rock formations have been natural environments in themselves, which have been present and integrated with more common ecosystems throughout natural history. The challenge is how to understand and work with natural ecosystems well enough to not burden them with salt concentrations that harm them, and perhaps even to fit and enrich them.

sunstone 8y ago

The sun desalinates almost all the rain that falls to earth everyday from the oceans.

ticviking 8y ago

This site is a bit more radical in how they go about it, but I know that in Utah we have several structures build from salt quarried nearby(huge deposits near the Salt Lake) and then treated to be water resistant. I imagine a similar thing is possible but maybe not efficient. http://buildingwithseawater.com/?myportfoliotype=the-salt-building-block http://buildingwithseawater.com/?myportfoliotype=the-salt-bu...

cwkoss 8y ago

Form it into bricks and build things with it?