Business Opportunity

tahanson43206 · 2021-08-28 09:54:18

Nice Volley!

For Louis re #75

The purpose of my "business advice" is to try to save you (and your hapless investors) the embarrassment of lost millions when no one wants a mechanical piece of jewelry anywhere near their person.

The US has succumbed to the European influence upon occasion, but that has ** never ** been the norm. The current standard is set by the truly wealthy in the US, who wear distinctly understated attire on everything but state occasions, and I note that even there the style is understated.

The point I was trying to make, in the face of your clinging to ancient ideas, is that a direction to look for value for products from Mars is the combination of a talent pool of significance, and the obvious advantages of harnessed nanotechnology.

It is entirely feasible for the power of a Year 2000 supercomputer to reside in the physical dimensions of a typical wrist watch, and developers at Apple and elsewhere are pursuing that potential with all the talent and market based funding available to them.

If you are going to market products to a segment, why bother with the self-indulgent? Aim for the bulk of the population of Earth. Your stock will soar, even if the profit per transaction is small.

(th)

louis · 2021-08-28 17:43:33

I guess you must have American Gothic hanging on the wall.

The bulk of people on Earth are self-indulgent. They just adjust their self-indulgence to their resources. That's why so many people have become obese as food has become cheaper. And Americans are about the fattest people on Earth, surpassed only by the Samoans...or something like that.

I think the point is that we want the Mars economy to succeed and I believe it can succeed in lots of legitimate ways. Selling a range of Mars-assembled watches back on Earth is harmless enough compared with many other activities and will generate interest in Mars colonisation.

tahanson43206 wrote:

Nice Volley!
For Louis re #75
The purpose of my "business advice" is to try to save you (and your hapless investors) the embarrassment of lost millions when no one wants a mechanical piece of jewelry anywhere near their person.
The US has succumbed to the European influence upon occasion, but that has ** never ** been the norm. The current standard is set by the truly wealthy in the US, who wear distinctly understated attire on everything but state occasions, and I note that even there the style is understated.
The point I was trying to make, in the face of your clinging to ancient ideas, is that a direction to look for value for products from Mars is the combination of a talent pool of significance, and the obvious advantages of harnessed nanotechnology.
It is entirely feasible for the power of a Year 2000 supercomputer to reside in the physical dimensions of a typical wrist watch, and developers at Apple and elsewhere are pursuing that potential with all the talent and market based funding available to them.
If you are going to market products to a segment, why bother with the self-indulgent? Aim for the bulk of the population of Earth. Your stock will soar, even if the profit per transaction is small.
(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-08-29 00:49:13

For Louis re mechanical watches and time pieces ...

I've been dubious of the value of mechanical time pieces in the modern age, and thus dubious of your faith that there are humans who would want to attach a mechanical time piece to their bodies for the purpose of showing off ostentatious wealth.

However, after pondering your faith for a while, I realized there is a potential very significant market for very high quality mechanical time pieces .... All space craft are going to need very accurate time pieces for celestial navigation.

While the default time piece for spacecraft navigation is electronic, I can easily imagine that a very high quality mechanical ship's chronometer would be considered vital in any plan for a vessel.

While RobertDyck has not published anything about the equipment he would expect to incorporate in the pilot house of the Large Ship, I think that a vary high quality mechanical ship's chronometer would not be out of place.

The reason to have a mechanical backup chronometer is the risk of damage to any electronic device traveling in space.

(th)

Calliban · 2021-08-30 06:20:53

Most modern watches are a hybrid of electrical and mechanical systems. My Citizen watch has a solar cell built into its face, but mechanical hands.

The thing to remember is that mechanical systems can be beautiful in a way that electronic systems never will be. I could have bought a cheap digital watch for about 1% of the price of the watch that I actually wear. But it would be a naff piece of preformed plastic crap that is made in China. A good watch is as much a piece of jewelry as it is a time piece. That probably sounds vain and shallow, but most human beings have at least a streak of vanity whether they are prepared to admit it or not. Also, I am not interested in fitbits or bits of electronics that are superfluous and may even be used to track me. I bet that there are billions of people on Earth that feel the same way.

I think Louis's idea may have value, if and only if, the watches are of comparable quality to the high end products that sell on Earth. If they can include native Martian jewels (especially if these are unique and not available on Earth) then people may indeed be prepared to pay somewhat more for something that is novel, unusual and literally comes from another planet. If platinum, gold and silver are more abundant on Mars, then the cost of delivery to Earth can be directly balanced by the additional value added by these materials.

I doubt that watch making will ever be a large proportion of Martian GDP. But it is a business idea that has some value for what it is. There are Earthly examples that are comparable. Those pretty table cloths make only a small contribution to Spanish GDP. But they remain something that they can none the less sell for profit, along with a million other things.

What Mars does possess that the Earth does not, is huge volumes of mineral ores and volatile elements in a relatively shallow gravity well. Anything that needs to be made for use anywhere other than Earth surface, is energetically cheaper if produced on Mars and delivered from Mars. That even includes things delivered to Low Earth Orbit. Ultimately, a watch or any other piece of equipment produced on Mars and sent to Earth Orbit, will have an advantage not just because of novelty value but directly lower cost. Climbing up the the steep curve in space-time that is Earth's gravity well requires enormous energy delivered at high rates of power. That will always be relatively expensive, if we can make the same delivered goods in a shallower gravity well. If we ever do get to the position where large amounts of infrastructure are needed in near Earth space, Mars has an inherent cost advantage in producing it. If it needs to be delivered to Earth surface, not so much.

Last edited by Calliban (2021-08-30 06:36:36)

tahanson43206 · 2021-08-30 12:46:21

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/heim … 37212.html

Millar said that the price of their limestone is, when government incentives and subsidies are included, already at price parity with industry norms. But as energy costs drop and scales rise, the ratio will grow more attractive. It's also nice that their product is indistinguishable from "natural" limestone. "We don't require any retrofitting for the concrete providers — they just buy our synthetic calcium carbonate rather than buy it from mining companies," he explained.
All in all it seems to make for a promising investment, and though Heimdal has not yet made its public debut (that would be forthcoming at Y Combinator's Summer 2021 Demo Day) it has attracted a $6.4 million seed round. The participating investors are Liquid2 Ventures, Apollo Projects, Soma Capital, Marc Benioff, Broom Ventures, Metaplanet, Cathexis Ventures, and as mentioned above, Yishan Wong.
Heimdal has already signed LOIs with several large cement and glass manufacturers, and is planning its first pilot facility at a U.S. desalination plant. After providing test products to its partners on the scale of tens of tons, they plan to enter commercial production in 2023.

These folks see a business opportunity in the otherwise unwelcome concentrated brine from desalination plants.

They would (if successful) generate lime for the construction industry, and deliver CO2 depleted sea water back to the ocean where it can absorb CO2 from the atmosphere.

This is a long term investment for someone(s), but it looks (to me at least) like a win-win-win situation.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-03 05:39:27

This post is about the Fuel Depot business opportunity ....

There is a long running topic on refueling on orbit ....

Recently focus has sharpened on the advantages and disadvantages of bladder vs ullage systems, with a gravity gradient option added for good measure.

It seems to me that the technical challenges of refueling on orbit will be of sufficient magnitude to justify a business specialization in the art.

It is entirely possible that SpaceX will attempt to design and build a system to meet their needs, but it would seem to me better for progress of the human enterprise to standardize on a fuel transfer technology and provide services to all comers.

*** Nice to see the contribution by RobertDyck to On Orbit fuel depot topic
The two recommendations (ullage vs bladder) are very much in play at this point, as the SpaceX engineers attempt to solve a problem never before attempted on any kind of scale, if attempted at all.
Ullage would seem by far the simpler to implement, at a cost of either propellant or ion throw mass.
A bladder on the scale of SpaceX Starship tanks would be a remarkable piece of engineering, and failure would mean return of the vessel to Earth.
Failure of the ullage thruster would mean a delay for repair or replacement of the thruster.
The possibility of failure of the ullage thruster could be addressed by keeping duplicate thrusters in orbit, or providing backup on the tanker itself.
It will definitely be interesting to see which of the two technologies wins the debate at SpaceX.
The rotating fuel depot idea of Calliban seems like a long shot at this point, but with a bit of clever engineering, the Large Ship design could be adapted for the purpose. Momentum management in such a system would be a significant challenge. Mass and rate of movement of masses would be balanced from docking of vessels to release after refueling procedures are complete.
Startrek writers seem to have never worried about such issues.

(th)

Calliban · 2021-09-03 06:07:38

If it is possible to produce a flexible bladder material, that will survive repeated flexing at LOX/CH4 propellant temperatures reliably enough, then this is probably going to be the cost optimum solution.

Using rotation to create artificial gravity, requires a certain amount of ballast mass at a minimum, to ensure that the tanker tanks remain uphill compared to the Starship tanks. It also depends upon external pipework that can be plugged in, as there needs to be a continuous downhill gravity gradient within the propellant transfer lines. So the lines need to follow the curvature of the spin axis, unless some sort of siphon can be arranged. So provided it can be done reliably and without high risk of failure, a bladder tank is a more logistically attractive option. If it can't, some sort of piston arrangement is another option. Using artificial gravity means launching a rig into orbit, with counterweight and propellant lines, that both ships can then dock to.

The other alternative, using thrust to create artificial gravity, may have some merit that outweighs the extra propellant cost. If acceleration is linear, then the tanker propellant tanks will always be uphill of the Starship tanks. This means that the tanker does not need separate payload tanks. The same tanks that carry the propellant needed to accelerate it to orbital velocity can carry the extra propellant that is its payload. This would offer some weight and simplicity advantages that may offset the cost and mass of the extra propellant.

I don't honestly know what the best option is. This is where we need a team that weigh all of the development, operational and capital costs, along with relevant mission risks and use a CBA method to arrive at the best overall solution. Without that, all we can do is make educated guesses.

Last edited by Calliban (2021-09-03 06:09:38)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-04 08:41:05

For Calliban re #82

Thanks for your concise review of the options for on-orbit refueling ...

Your observation about the need for a team to study the problem is surely happening in real time, since on-orbit refueling is a critical path item for SpaceX. The technical challenges of making a bladder large enough to fit inside a LOX or liquefied fuel tank ** before ** the tank is welded shut is certainly right up there with other challenges SpaceX has faced.

Once sealed inside the tank, the bladder must be gently filled so that no wrinkles occur, all without visibility from the outside.

No doubt these challenges can be overcome, but they would defeat a traditional American company.

Furthermore, the bladder must survive repeated use in production service. No repair is possible ... the entire rocket has to be discarded if the bladder rips. That seems like quite a business risk, but it might well be worth the expense.

On the other hand, the ullage method appears to be possible without development of new technology.

However, the ** real ** business opportunity is for a third party to offer artificial gravity refueling services, so the primary customer is freed of having to worry about that. Ullage is a form of artificial gravity, and it can be provided by a third party using a space tug in LEO.

While we wait for SpaceNut to show us what his "W" concept might be, we can continue developing a vision of a rotating refueling depot.

In the past day or so, inspired by your original suggestion of a rotating solution, I've been thinking about a mechanical arrangement that would facilitate on orbit liquid transfer in a rotating framework.

Bearing in mind that equal masses must be processed simultaneously in all three dimensions of the depot, we can image two tankers arriving simultaneously at both ends of a central shaft. For the purposes of this discussion, I am thinking about RobertDyck's Large Ship, but extending the central column an equal distance from the plane of the habitat ring.

Per RobertDyck's explanation of docking in the Large Ship topic recently, I would imagine the two tankers docking at the tips of each end of the central shaft. At that point, a Canadian Arm (Squared) would grasp each tanker and gently and smoothly move them to opposite sides of the depot, so the masses are always in balance.

The tankers would be moved to positions above receiving tanks on the depot. They would transfer their contents to the receiving tanks using intelligent hoses.

After all liquid has been transferred from both tankers, they would be moved simultaneously back to the docking ports at the ends of the central shaft.

At that point, they could disengage simultaneously and return to Earth.

To accept fuel from the depot, two Starships would follow a similar path, but they would be placed ** outside ** of the depot tanks.

The process would be similar, but the work of moving the filled Starships back to the docking ports would be greater than was true for any of the previous transactions, because the Starships would be filled to the top.

However, we can assume Canadian Arm Squared is up to the task!

As before, after the two Starships are positioned at the docking ports, they can release simultaneously and proceed on their mission.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-04 08:49:01

This new Business Opportunity is (or should be) relatively easy for almost anyone to pursue...

It is evident from the recent historical record that flooding will occur in the United States, and vehicles that are not air tight will fill up with water. An inexpensive survival technique is to enclose the vehicle in a tarp cut for the purpose. The tarp would be carried in the trunk along with ropes to secure the edges above the water line.

There are a significant number of companies in the United States (and surely in other countries) able to make tarps to order.

An entrepreneur with a discretionary fund for high risk initiatives could test the market potential with telephone or Internet market surveys. There is no need to lay in a stock of tarps for this purpose. During the market test phase, tarps can be ordered by vehicle type, and all costs borne by the customer. However, if there appears to be a market of sufficient size, then costs can be reduced by ordering a run of tarps for a vehicle for which the water seal is popular.

*** Update at 14:05 local time ...

Just sent this via contact form to a supplier of tarps ...

This is a product suggestion for which your company appears to be well positioned .... as recent years have shown, the US is subject to flooding. Modern cars are fairly air tight, and many will float However, safety can be increased dramatically if customers can order a custom made tarp to enclose the car (or small truck) in a strong membrane.
A large company like <snip> (I'm a .... owner) might be interested in working with you to offer their customers tarps designed for each of their vehicles.
You would unfold the tarp, drive over it (before the flood arrives) and pull the tarp edges up around the car/truck with rope.
If the kit includes a collapsible paddle, a family could maneuver the floating vehicle toward a place of safety.
(th)

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tahanson43206 · 2021-09-08 18:42:15

Our community has a startup culture (of sorts) ... no comparison to Silicon Valley of course ....

The item below showed up on a recent newsletter ....

Power to Hydrogen Innovating Hydrogen Energy
Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe. Hydrogen makes the sun burn bright and powers rocket ships. Hydrogen fuel is also eco-friendly, but there is a catch. Hydrogen doesn’t exist in nature in its pure form. Hydrogen must be extracted from other compounds to use this energy for vehicle fuel or to power infrastructure. The process is costly and does have an impact on the environment.
Power to Hydrogen (P2H2) is tackling the challenge head-on. A spinout from Rev1 portfolio company pH Matter, Power to Hydrogen is developing a revolutionary device that efficiently and cost-effectively generates hydrogen and stores energy.
“Hydrogen is abundant and incredibly light, but you need a lot of it to do anything,” said Paul Matter, Co-Founder and CTO of Power to Hydrogen. “Equipment to make hydrogen from renewables often sits idle because the equipment is only operated when there is excess wind or sun. Our Clean Energy Bridge is a reversible fuel cell, which means it can work in two directions–one as an electrolyzer, splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen, and then in the opposite direction by taking stored hydrogen gas and turning it into power.”

This two-way process sounds useful to me ...

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tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 11:51:57

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/weste … eid=yhoof2

San Diego draws 10% of its water from the Carlsberg Desalinization Plant. But that is hardly a generalizable solution, because the process is terribly energy intensive and the byproduct of salt and other minerals potentially causes significant environmental damage if dumped back into the ocean.

I decided to offer this quote as an example of the short-sighted and simple-minded thinking that is plaguing the US right now.

The ** entire ** Earth is delivered fresh water ** every ** day, using nothing but photons from the Sun as the energy source.

The material separated from water is valuable in its own right!

Deuterium is present in sea water, and it can be separated and sold separately as a fuel for fusion.

So what if the use is still 50 years out? The water will keep just fine until the market is ready.

Minerals present in sea water are independently valuable.

Salt is a useful commodity, and, like Deuterium, it can be saved until there is a market demand for it, or for Sodium or Chlorine or both.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-15 17:27:32

The real issue is get more rain for fresh water and use less energy is what California should be looking to do with that free solar energy....

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 17:51:46

For SpaceNut re #87

Are you thinking of making rain? Impressive if you can do it!

Storyline
Lizzie Curry is on the verge of becoming a hopeless old maid. Her wit and intelligence and skills as a homemaker can't make up for the fact that she's just plain plain. Even the town sheriff, File, for whom she harbors a secret yen, won't take a chance --- until the town suffers a drought and into the lives of Lizzie and her brothers and father comes one Bill Starbuck - profession: Rainmaker.—A.L.Beneteau <albl@inforamp.net>

The review quoted above says that Burt Lancaster asked to play the part of Bill Starbuck.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-15 18:24:56

We should be able to create sub tropical storms by spraying a very fine mist of the ocean water into the air high enough away from the coast line to give it a chance to be picked up by prevailing winds. Giving it a circular spray sequence should cause a weather pattern to be started. We are getting dumped on by these tropical to huricane levels storms that dump tons of water where ever it makes land.

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 18:54:01

For SpaceNut re #89 ... Nature fills the atmosphere with moisture, by energizing water molecules to break free of the liquid surface of the ocean. While much of the water vapor is not visible to humans, some of it condenses on tiny particles of material floating in the air, we we see the result as clouds.

The problem we humans seem to be facing is that Nature distributes all that water in patterns that make sense to Nature, but which are inconvenient for humans. We humans receive too much water where we already have enough, and insufficient water where we really need it.

The desalination process is designed to do an end run around Nature, when Nature is not being helpful.

Your post #89 is interesting because (if I understand it correctly) you are proposing to deliver ocean water to a high elevation as is. This is an interesting idea I have never seen in print before, and certainly have not encountered in personal conversation, or via video of any kind.

In other words, from my perspective (limited as it is of course) this is a genuinely NEW idea.

A mist of salt water would contain it's own nuclei for making cloud droplets.

What is not clear is whether the salt would remain with the droplets when they fall to Earth.

I assume they would, but really have no idea. This is an idea that deserves scientific testing.

However, if there is an enterprising forum member who has the time to investigate, there might be research on record to show what happens when sea water is dispersed as mist at high elevation.

Acid Rain is an example from recent human history of delivery of contaminated water to the ground.

I wonder if Salt Rain would be similar?

In any case, this is definitely an interesting idea.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-15 19:05:25

Acid rain is from sulfur dioxide and chlorides getting to the particles of water that is in the clouds of evaporations that we do not see.
If I remember its silver oxides that is used to seed cloud development to create rain to fall.
Salt I would think would if we seed the clouds fall out as its heavier before it reaches land leaving just the fresh water to fall later as it cools.

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 19:19:36

For SpaceNut re #91

OK ... you've written a hypothesis ... it should be possible to write a procedure to test the hypothesis.

My prediction is that the sodium-chloride will remain with the water.

Your prediction appears (as I read it) to be that the molecular weight of sodium-chloride molecules might cause them to separate from water molecules, if a mixture is dispersed in the air.

This should be relatively easy to test, and therefore it should have been done.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-15 19:51:37

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_seeding

What Is Cloud Seeding, and Does It Work? Weather Modification Explained, Clouds can be prodded to make more rain and snow. But is it ethical?

Cloud seeding—the act of injecting chemicals such as dry ice (solid CO2), silver iodide (AgI), table salt (NaCl), into clouds for the sake of altering the weather outcome (more rain, more snow, less fog, less hail)—is one such type of weather modification.
According to the Weather Modification Association, at least eight states, including Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Nevada, California, New Mexico, and Texas, practice cloud seeding to boost precipitation, especially winter snowfall. Despite its popularity as a tool to cope with the lack of water shortages resulting from droughts and snow droughts, especially across the western United States, though, the questions and controversy surrounding its efficacy and ethics remain hotly debated.

dammed political rose colored glasses...
https://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/154923.pdf

Design of an artificial rain system by means of sea water vapor equipment heated by the sunlight

edit url has been fixed

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 20:33:55

For SpaceNut ... re #93 ... the link to the artificial rain paper didn't work for me.

However, Google found this:
https://ams.confex.com/ams/13Meso/webpr … 54923.html

The 13Meso folder seemed to work ... I tried it more than once.

I'll come back after looking at the paper ...

SearchTerm:Artificial Rain
SearchTerm:Rain artificial

***
PS ... this discussion is more than theoretical for a relative who lives in Phoenix...

The desalination process in use around the world works, and it delivers potable water, but your idea might deliver rain, if the salt does not stay with the water and coat the ground, as I would expect.

An alternative is the example of the Salton Sea ... Nature evaporates water from the salty brine of the lake, and the lake is shrinking. However, it is not at all clear that the liberated water molecules do any good in California, or anywhere else.

I'm off to look at the paper ...

OK SpaceNut ... this was a teaser ... the text is promising. However, there is an indication at the bottom of the teaser that the paper was withdrawn. I'm not sure if that note is a general bit of documentation, or if it applies to the paper in question. In any case, the author promises to show equipment capable of evaporating sea water using sunlight, and directing the resulting cloud mass to needed regions on Earth. The author does indicate that the equipment is large, and indeed, it would have to be large, to produce the same effect as Nature provides by beaming sunlight on the open ocean.

At a minimum I find this experience to be on the frustrating side.

The author does refer to salt produced by the process, and simply says the salt can be disposed of "easily".

This paper does NOT appear to answer the question of what happens when a mass of sea water is lifted to high altitude and sprayed out as mist. That is an experiment that could be performed by a military airlift craft.

The sensors needed would be designed to float in the air where the salt water is dispersed, and they would allow ground operators to track the plume and find out what happens when it finally reaches the ground.

My guess is that under such conditions, the quantity of sea water introduced would be so small, compared to the atmosphere into which it is introduced, that the sea water component would be distributed by random movement so that meaningful results would be difficult to obtain.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-15 21:22:56

For SpaceNut re water from sea water for inland locations on Earth...

The artificial rain idea appears to be no more substantial than the scam of claimed "rainmaking" powers ....

I am hoping you have better luck than I did ...

***
In the mean time, I mentioned the relative who lives in Phoenix, Arizona, USA...

The water for that community is decreasing, and will eventually become zero.

Salt River Project
The city of Phoenix 's water supply comes primarily from the Salt River Project (SRP) which brings water by canal and pipeline from the Salt and Verde Rivers , and the Central Arizona Project (CAP) which transports Colorado River water.
Water Supply Q ＆ A - City of Phoenix
https://www.phoenix.gov › waterservices › climatechange

Next...

People also ask
Is Phoenix Arizona going to run out of water?
Will we run out of water?" The answer is no. ... That's because SRP, Valley cities, the Central Arizona Project (CAP) and the Arizona Department of Water Resources are working together to track drought conditions and plan for a reliable water future.

Happy Talk!

Unlike most U.S. cities, Greater Phoenix has access to four sources of water.
Water from in-state rivers and streams – SRP manages seven reservoirs that store water from the Salt and Verde rivers and the East Clear Creek watershed. Over half of the water supply in the Phoenix metro area comes from the SRP water system.
Colorado River water – The CAP delivers Colorado River water to the Valley. This represents the area's second-largest water supply.
Reclaimed water – SRP delivers fresh water to cities and towns throughout the Valley. They then treat the water and deliver it to homes and businesses – but that’s just the beginning. Waste water gets a second chance at life when it’s recaptured, treated and recycled. This recycled water – called reclaimed water – can be used for farming, landscaping and more.
Groundwater – Groundwater is water that's stored underground. SRP runs a vast groundwater delivery system that includes 270 high-capacity groundwater wells. Valley cities run large groundwater supply systems too.

All happy talk!

Meanwhile, there is an inexhaustible source of water in the Gulf of California, and an enormous amount of sunlight available to perform useful work if given a chance. At the moment, most of that sunlight bounces back to the sky to entertain the occasional space tourist.

What is the elevation of Phoenix?

About 11,100,000 results (0.98 seconds)
Phoenix/Elevation
1,086′
The elevation of Phoenix, AZ is 1,086 feet (331 m). Due to its many mountains, the state of Arizona actually has one of the highest average elevations of the entire US, with an average of 4,100 feet (1250 m).Jul 27, 2021
Phoenix Elevation - VacationIdea.com
https://vacationidea.com › arizona › phoenix-elevation

So water from the Gulf of California would need to be lifted 1,000 feet (313 meters)

How far away is the Gulf of California?

I get 300 kilometers by estimating using a ruler on a Google map. There is no direct distance available.

What is the water consumption of Phoenix?

Since the total water consumption is divided between four sources, it might be difficult to measure.

In any case, if the Happy Talkers who live in Phoenix want a 5th source of water, they would do well to start thinking about a reciprocal trade arrangement with Mexico. Mexico would quite reasonably want a piece of the action if they allow "their" sea water to be shipped to Arizona.

How much water does Phoenix use per year?
In the Phoenix metropolitan region, we use about 2.3 million acre-feet of water. An acre-foot is the amount of water required to cover an acre of land with one foot of water. It is about 325,851 gallons which is about how much an average family of 4 uses in a year.
Water Used in Phoenix | Ask A Biologist
https://askabiologist.asu.edu › questions › how-much-wate...
Search for: How much water does Phoenix use per year?

That quote above says that an acre-foot is 325851 gallons, and they use 2.3 million acre-feet in a year.

Calc says that is 749457300000 gallons .... 7.49x10^11

I've run out of steam, but it should be possible to determine the size of pipe needed to move that much water, the amount of power to lift the water, and the amount of solar panels needed to convert it to fresh water while saving all the suspended matter in useful separated form.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-16 00:50:53

https://now.northropgrumman.com/making- … ipulation/

Can we create clouds from sea water which will increase chances of rain and reflect sunlight creating cooling effect on earth?

Could spraying particles into marine clouds help cool the planet?

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-16 06:34:54

For SpaceNut re #96

The image you showed is quite impressive (to me for sure!). The ship that makes mist from sea water consumes prodigious amounts of energy.

Please identify the source of energy used. (I'll follow the links you provided later today when I'm on a PC that can open them)

The Japanese teaser paper contained some related ideas ... basically the Japanese author was proposing to make artificial clouds, and he was proposing to make artificial clouds up wind of a location that needs water. The atmosphere would (presumably) transport the water to the land where it is needed.

There, artificial cloud seeding would be needed to release the water in a controlled manner, so that the water is delivered to the land where it is needed at a rate that is acceptable.

We still do NOT know if salt would drop out while the cloud is over the ocean, or if it would continue with the water molecules and fall on the land.

Per Google:

Mass of sodium Chloride 58.443 g/mol
Mass of water molecule 18.01528 g/mol

This set of numbers from Google implies that your theory that salt would fall out due to gravity makes sense.

However, the forces that bind molecules in a mixture are (as I understand it) far stronger than mere gravity.

If your ship tosses a cubic meter of sea water into the air in the form of vapor, I would expect the water molecules to maintain their attraction to sodium chloride molecules despite the change of their circumstances.

I'd like to see an actual experiment to test your theory. Your theory may be absolutely correct.

OK! This makes sense! There ** have ** been studies of salt borne by wind!

Per Google:

Studies show salt air affects metals more than 50 miles inland
pomametals.com › salt-air-inland-distance-for-metal
Mar 4, 2019 · How many miles inland will salt air travel and corrode metal? ... most of America's coast witnesses mild levels of salt intrusion.
People also ask
How far inland does salt air reach?
How far inland does salty air affect metals?
How far does salt travel?
How far does sea Mist travel?
How far away from an ocean do you have to live to avoid salt air ...
www.quora.com › How-far-away-from-an-ocean-do-you-have-to-live-to-a...
So you'll get salt air blown further inland on a west coast than on an east coast. ... How long does it take for metal to corrode in saltwater? 664 Views.
What makes the ocean air salty considering that salt does not ...
Does moisture in the ocean's atmosphere contain salts like NaCl?
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The smell of salt air, a mile high and 900 miles inland | UW News
www.washington.edu › news › 2010/03/11 › the-smell-of-salt-air-a-mile-hi...
Mar 11, 2010 · Wind and waves kick up spray, and bits of sodium chloride — common table salt — can permeate the air. It is believed that as much as 10 billion ...
Sea spray - Wikipedia

OK SpaceNut .... there appear to be reports of salt remaining with sea water as far as 900 miles inland.

I haven't followed any of the links provided by Google, but on the face of it, I see actual evidence/observation leading to the conclusion that the sea water misting machine will put salt molecules into the air along with water molecules, and there is no natural mechanism to remove them.

Gravity is a weak force, but it does work uniformly, so I would expect salt molecules to descend slowly over time as they bounce against their neighbors in the atmosphere, but the forces of wind will be far stronger.

If someone has the time and energy (and zeal) to pursue some or all of the links above, there may be exact numbers to study, showing the rate of descent of salt molecules in atmosphere on Earth at ambient conditions.

My bet has been that salt would be distributed all over the land if this concept were to be applied at scale.

A sea water desalination procedure using water piped from an ocean has a number of distinct advantages over the alternatives...

The energy required is precisely measurable.

The quantity deliverable is precisely predictable.

The equipment needed is precisely identifiable.

The quality of the water delivered is precisely knowable.

In short, it would be (and is) a lot of work to put together a water desalination system for Phoenix, (or any inland city), but the benefits far out weight the effort required to make the investment, and to maintain it.

Atomic power is a natural resource to energize such a system.

Solar panels could do the the job, no doubt, but atomic power would be far more compact, and (a guess at this point) would turn out to be the best use of the investment funds needed.

This has been a useful discussion, incomplete as it is at this point. I'll attempt to convey part of it to the relative, so see if he might be willing to confront the Happy Talk folks in official Phoenix leadership. They have four sources of fresh water right now, but they are all likely to run out or decline significantly. The ** only ** way they can insure themselves of an adequate, consistent supply of fresh water is by pulling sea water from the Gulf of California and processing it to separate suspended matter from water and forward the separated material for use as needed.

As mentioned earlier, harvesting Deuterium would be a long term investment with great potential value when fusion machines come online.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-16 08:47:06

For Calliban .... I'm hoping you might be interested in working with me to estimate what it would take to build an atomic plant large enough to supply all the fresh water currently consumed by the City of Phoenix, Arizona, as reported earlier in this series.

We know:

1) The amount of fresh water consumed in a year
2) The elevation of Phoenix with respect to the ocean
3) The distance of the ocean (Gulf of California)

We would need to compute the amount of energy needed to pull sea water up (er, push sea water up) a pipe from the Gulf of California.

In addition, we would need to compute the amount of energy needed to separate the suspended matter in the sea water so every molecule can be used as tradable commodity.

From this, we can size the atomic plant needed to supply fresh water for Phoenix into perpetuity.

Cost estimates need to cover initial investment and ongoing maintenance. The total cost of all this equipment is then distributed over the delivered water and other recovered matter.

Whatever the costs are, they are more than compensated for by the reliability of supply to the population of Phoenix. A related benefit is that the water presently consumed by Phoenix can be released for consumption by others.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-09-28 06:17:04

Special item for SpaceNut ...

Earlier in this topic we were talking about making mist from sea water. Unresolved was the question of what happens to salt when that is done.

Australians appear to be using the tendency of salt to remain in the air to make clouds. One of your posts above hinted at that, because (as I recall) it included salt as an agent for serving as a nucleus for droplets. Here is a report on the use of that capability to increase cloud formation...

https://www.yahoo.com/news/little-fluff … 47794.html

Little fluffy clouds may help save Australia's Great Barrier Reef
A general view of Broadhurst Reef and a research vessel during the second field trial at Broadhurst Reef on the Great Barrier Reef
Stefica Nicol Bikes
Mon, September 27, 2021 9:04 PM
By Stefica Nicol Bikes
SYDNEY (Reuters) - To slow the speed at which high temperatures and warm waters bleach the corals of the Great Barrier Reef, Australian scientists are spraying droplets of ocean water into the sky to form clouds to protect the environmental treasure.
Researchers working on the so-called Cloud Brightening project said they use a turbine to spray microscopic sea particles to thicken existing clouds and reduce sunlight on the world's largest coral reef ecosystem located off Australia's northeast coast.
The water droplets evaporate leaving only tiny salt crystals which float up into the atmosphere allowing water vapour to condense around them, forming clouds, said Daniel Harrison, a senior lecturer at Southern Cross University, who runs the project.

This report reinforces my impression that the water delivered by this process is NOT desalinated.

However, for the purposes of creating shade over the coral reefs, this would seem to be a useful technique.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-28 11:23:32

Bleaching is from these causes such as over oxygenation, high chlorination and high levels of UV as typical to the effects seen.

Clouds tend to block the UV so that would make sense.

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