3 ms·

Just spitballing here, can't you just store the salt alone and make the hyper-saturated salt water on the fly? That seems reasonable.

wildzzz 16d ago
How do you get the salt to make the brine? You'd need to evaporate the water from the brine which means you either need very large evaporation pools or lots of energy to boil the water (and money to maintain the immense amount of scale you create).
- dylan604 16d ago
  Build a water desalination plant next door. Make it a twofer
  - seb1204 16d ago
    Agreed, considering that sor.say future wars will be around (drinking) water it seems reasonable to at least link some cost to the brine or the water required.
- rightnutwingjob 16d ago
  Salt mines. Here’s one in the USA: https://youtube.com/shorts/zXzvUKXhMBo https://youtube.com/shorts/zXzvUKXhMBo Here’s a list of salt mines in the USA: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Salt_mines_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Salt_mines_in_the_Uni...
- nostrademons 16d ago
  They used an even easier method than what's described in the other comments: the salt comes from the initial construction of the SPR caverns. When they first built the SPR, they filled it with water to wash away any easily-dissolvable salt features as well as any impurities inside the cavern. The result of filling the cavern and letting it sit for a while is saturated brine: eventually all the salt that can be dissolved is dissolved. Then they pumped that brine to aboveground brine ponds. Those brine ponds contain exactly the amount of salt water needed to completely fill the cavern with saturated brine. So future drawdowns just use the same water that has already been saturated. Some of the water will evaporate on the surface, leaving behind salt crystals at the edges of the brine pond, but the crucial thing to remember is the quantity of salt in the newly created brine pond is equal to the amount of salt needed to generate enough saturated brine to completely fill the cavern. Because that's where it came from in the first place. So if you need to replenish it with more water, you just pump in fresh water, it dissolves the extra salt in the brine pond, filter out any surface guck, and then pump it back into the cabin. Periodically you might want to add a little extra salt if say the cavern expands or wind erosion carries salt away from the dry brine pond bed. But this quantity is much less, it's the delta in cavern size, not the full initial size of the cavern.
  - justinator 16d ago
    Amazing -- appreciate the explanation.

wildzzz 16d ago

How do you get the salt to make the brine? You'd need to evaporate the water from the brine which means you either need very large evaporation pools or lots of energy to boil the water (and money to maintain the immense amount of scale you create).

dylan604 16d ago
Build a water desalination plant next door. Make it a twofer
- seb1204 16d ago
  Agreed, considering that sor.say future wars will be around (drinking) water it seems reasonable to at least link some cost to the brine or the water required.
rightnutwingjob 16d ago
Salt mines. Here’s one in the USA: https://youtube.com/shorts/zXzvUKXhMBo https://youtube.com/shorts/zXzvUKXhMBo Here’s a list of salt mines in the USA: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Salt_mines_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Salt_mines_in_the_Uni...
nostrademons 16d ago
They used an even easier method than what's described in the other comments: the salt comes from the initial construction of the SPR caverns. When they first built the SPR, they filled it with water to wash away any easily-dissolvable salt features as well as any impurities inside the cavern. The result of filling the cavern and letting it sit for a while is saturated brine: eventually all the salt that can be dissolved is dissolved. Then they pumped that brine to aboveground brine ponds. Those brine ponds contain exactly the amount of salt water needed to completely fill the cavern with saturated brine. So future drawdowns just use the same water that has already been saturated. Some of the water will evaporate on the surface, leaving behind salt crystals at the edges of the brine pond, but the crucial thing to remember is the quantity of salt in the newly created brine pond is equal to the amount of salt needed to generate enough saturated brine to completely fill the cavern. Because that's where it came from in the first place. So if you need to replenish it with more water, you just pump in fresh water, it dissolves the extra salt in the brine pond, filter out any surface guck, and then pump it back into the cabin. Periodically you might want to add a little extra salt if say the cavern expands or wind erosion carries salt away from the dry brine pond bed. But this quantity is much less, it's the delta in cavern size, not the full initial size of the cavern.
- justinator 16d ago
  Amazing -- appreciate the explanation.