5 ms·
Build more nuclear reactors and use them to desalinate huge amounts of water?
by xedrac 5y ago
Build more nuclear reactors and use them to desalinate huge amounts of water?
- loeg 5y agoOr raise the price of water to include the cost of externalities, which will naturally price out water-costly crops like almonds. I really doubt that almonds are profitable enough to justify a massive nuclear + desalination plan on their own.
- s0rce 5y agoAlmonds could probably still be profitable with buried drip irrigation as the water usage would be drastically reduced, they are still expensive and prices could likely go higher before you stopped selling them. You'd price out low value crops like alfalfa that feeds livestock.
- lifty 5y agoOnce fusion becomes viable, desalination might become viable.
- adrianN 5y agoOr build more solar and desalinate cheaper. Nuclear is one of the more expensive sources of power we have.
- s0rce 5y agoI think this would still be massively more expensive than the current cost farmers pay for water. Just increase prices and let them reduce usage before trying to grow crops with expensive desalinated water.
- adrianN 5y agoOf course it would be more expensive, otherwise they'd already do it. It's always cheaper to just exploit existing resources.
- timellis-smith 5y agoI've always wondered if you could combine CSP with water distillation (i.e. you evaporate salt water to steam to power turbines and capture the condensate) so that at the end you get both power and desalinated water.
- adrianN 5y agoI would assume that the bit of salt that is left in the steam will absolute wreck your turbine, but I don't know very much about turbines.
- masonic 5y agoThen, what do you do with the resulting brine?
- supertrope 5y agoIncreasing efficiency must come first as using exotic methods to increase supply is very expensive. Just like how cutting wasteful electricity consumption is greener and cheaper than supersizing a solar panel array.