WEBVTT - TechStuff Classic: TechStuff Gets Salty 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios, 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:14.440 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:17.799 I'm your host, Jovian Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:20.239 How Stuff Works and iHeart radio and I love all 0:00:20.480 --> 0:00:24.400 things tech. And you know, sometimes here on the show, 0:00:24.840 --> 0:00:27.160 I can get a little salty, which is why we're 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:31.560 looking at this classic episode tech Stuff Gets Salty and 0:00:31.640 --> 0:00:36.360 originally published on October one, two thousand twelve. And you know, 0:00:36.400 --> 0:00:39.120 I'm being all ki and everything, but yes, this is 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:43.200 an episode. It's about desalination, the process of removing salt 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:46.280 from water and the technology behind it. I hope you 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:51.400 enjoy this classic episode. So, Chris, one of the big 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:55.960 issues facing the world today is access to clean, drinkable water, 0:00:56.920 --> 0:00:59.480 and so we wanted to talk to someone who's an 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:03.720 expert in a particular form of processing water to make 0:01:03.960 --> 0:01:07.200 something that isn't drinkable into drinkable water, and we have 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:11.040 with us from ge Eric Hansen. Eric, welcome to the 0:01:11.080 --> 0:01:14.240 to the podcast very much. We're excited to have you here, 0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:18.000 and we're going to talk a bit about desalination, which 0:01:18.080 --> 0:01:20.600 is a process where we're removing things like salt and 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:24.840 other minerals from water so that you have clean drinking 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:28.679 water as an as a byproduct, really the other one 0:01:28.760 --> 0:01:33.520 being the the salt the salute. So we want to 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:35.640 talk a little bit about the process that you guys 0:01:35.720 --> 0:01:38.240 use over at g the things that you're looking into, 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:41.480 and um, how that has changed over the years. So 0:01:41.760 --> 0:01:46.880 to really start off, what what are the greatest benefits 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:51.320 of desalination. Um, it's a great question. Uh. You know, 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:56.960 the world today uh bases you know, ever increasing challenges 0:01:56.960 --> 0:02:01.080 and stresses on water supplies. But the good news behind 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:05.680 that is the Earth's surfaces sent water. So even though 0:02:05.880 --> 0:02:08.800 less than one percent of that is accessible as fresh 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:12.760 water today, the rest of it is is seawater, and 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:16.200 we do have the technologies today to turn that into 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:20.040 usable water. So in fact, those technologies have been around 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:23.920 for a really long time. Uh. You know, even hundreds 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:28.200 of years ago, people would boil water, capture the steam 0:02:28.240 --> 0:02:32.680 from that water, and use the condensation from that that 0:02:32.840 --> 0:02:37.680 steam as purified water. So the concepts of of desalinating 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:42.919 water using heat or thermal technologies, those aren't new concepts. 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:46.000 They've been around for a while. Desalination has been going 0:02:46.000 --> 0:02:48.600 on for a long time and even up through the 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:53.840 most of the nineties, UH, thermal technologies were still very prevalent, 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:57.960 albeit a little bit more advanced than just simply boiling water. 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:00.680 But the concepts were still the same. Up the water, 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:05.400 capturing the steam, and condensing it. Sure, in the in 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:12.080 the nineties, different technologies started being applied. UH. Instead of 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:14.840 heating up the water and boiling it, what we started 0:03:14.880 --> 0:03:21.760 doing was applying membranes, special kinds of very advanced filters. UH. 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:24.560 These membranes are able to remove the salts from the water, 0:03:25.240 --> 0:03:29.160 UH with much less energy. Takes a lot of energy 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:33.200 to boil water. So using membrane technologies, we've been able 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:35.480 to reduce the amount of energy it takes to remove 0:03:35.520 --> 0:03:38.440 the salt from water. And over the last twenty years 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:41.200 there have been just a lot of advances in that 0:03:41.360 --> 0:03:43.920 in that field, which I'm sure we'll go into a 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:48.600 little bit more in our conversation. Sure, making the cost 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:52.600 of desalinating water come down, UH, you know every year, right, 0:03:52.680 --> 0:03:56.400 And so you're talking about these these semi permeable membranes. 0:03:56.800 --> 0:04:00.440 Essentially we're looking at a process of reverse auso osis 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:06.440 really um forcing the using pressure essentially to force water 0:04:06.560 --> 0:04:10.360 that has various minerals and salt in it. Through this membrane, 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:14.840 the membrane separates out the minerals the salts, and the 0:04:14.840 --> 0:04:19.560 water passes through. Normally, when you have a membrane between 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.520 a solute and a solvent, the solvent is going to 0:04:23.600 --> 0:04:26.720 pass through the membrane until there's a an equilibrium there 0:04:26.760 --> 0:04:30.920 and osmosis pressure is osmotic pressure is built up. So 0:04:30.960 --> 0:04:33.640 in this case, we're actually applying energy on one side 0:04:33.680 --> 0:04:36.279 so that we get water on one end of the 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:39.080 membrane and everything else is on the other. Is that 0:04:39.080 --> 0:04:41.520 that sort of a bird's eye view of what that 0:04:41.560 --> 0:04:45.000 technology is all about. Yeah, you described it very well. 0:04:45.240 --> 0:04:48.680 You know. One of the biggest difference between membrane filtration 0:04:48.920 --> 0:04:52.000 and the types of filtration that most people are familiar with. 0:04:52.560 --> 0:04:55.200 It's when most people think of a filter, they imagine 0:04:55.360 --> 0:04:58.520 a barrier of some kind with one stream of water 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:02.760 flowing into it, things being removed by that barrier, and 0:05:02.800 --> 0:05:05.120 then one stream of water flowing out the other side, 0:05:05.400 --> 0:05:07.239 and then after a while you have to do something 0:05:07.240 --> 0:05:09.520 to get all this stuff you've removed off that barrier. 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:13.720 So membrane technology doesn't exactly work that way. You still 0:05:13.760 --> 0:05:17.880 have a barrier and it's the membrane. But in membrane technology, 0:05:18.279 --> 0:05:21.640 the feed stream is actually flowing across the membrane, so 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:25.680 you have one stream in, but then you're applying pressure, 0:05:25.920 --> 0:05:28.520 so some waters making it through the membrane. That's the 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:32.279 purified water without much salt in it, and all the salt, 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:34.240 all the salt is staying on the other side of 0:05:34.240 --> 0:05:37.359 the membrane. So in membrane technology, instead of one stream 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:39.560 in and one stream out, you actually have one stream 0:05:39.560 --> 0:05:44.200 in but two streams out, the saltier stream, so that 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:47.920 saltier stream the brine. I know that that has caused 0:05:48.000 --> 0:05:50.800 some problems in the past simply because Brian, you know, 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:53.440 what do you do with that after you've gone through 0:05:53.440 --> 0:05:58.240 the desalination process Now, Brian, because it has this concentrated 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.040 amount of salts and minerals in an it's actually denser 0:06:01.160 --> 0:06:05.960 than seawater. So if you were too simply dump that 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:09.000 brine into the sea, then it would it would sink 0:06:09.040 --> 0:06:11.040 to the bottom of the sea floor where it could 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:16.040 potentially cause damage depending upon the environment that you're in. Uh, 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:18.000 can you talk a little bit about some of the 0:06:18.520 --> 0:06:21.920 approaches to to take care of that problem. I know 0:06:21.960 --> 0:06:25.839 there's some about mixing the brine in with other water 0:06:26.000 --> 0:06:28.320 that's going to be running into the sea, so it 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:32.200 it dilutes it. So I mean, if you step back 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:36.479 and look at the desalination process, you know, from from 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:40.800 thirty feet, uh, it can simply be considered really part 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:45.520 of the normal water cycle, the hydrological cycle. So yes, 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:48.960 there's water with more salt going back into the ocean, 0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:53.360 but the water that's purified and it's then used, uh, 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:56.479 ultimately that goes back into the ocean as well, whether 0:06:56.520 --> 0:07:00.520 it comes through municipal wastewater and sanitary supers and it's 0:07:00.560 --> 0:07:03.320 treated you know, in many other ways. You know that 0:07:03.360 --> 0:07:07.240 water all does essentially return to the hydrological cycle at 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:10.440 some point. So you know, from a high level, the 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:13.560 mass balance is fine. The oceans aren't going to get 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:17.240 saltier because of this, because we are returning the purified 0:07:17.280 --> 0:07:19.440 water back to the oceans at some point as well. 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:24.200 So really, the the more immediate concern is just that 0:07:24.440 --> 0:07:28.000 very point at which you're introducing the brine back into 0:07:28.040 --> 0:07:32.520 the ocean, and depending on the characteristics of the seabed 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:35.840 and what's living in that area. Uh, sometimes there are 0:07:35.920 --> 0:07:39.360 special considerations that are taken. Uh. And you know, there 0:07:39.360 --> 0:07:41.960 are many different ways you can return the brine back 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:44.920 into the ocean. You can just have a pipe that 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:49.240 puts it right into the ocean. You can create an 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:53.880 elaborate grid of pipes underneath the seabed to uh, to 0:07:54.040 --> 0:07:56.880 blend it a little bit better. There's a number of 0:07:56.880 --> 0:08:00.520 different methods. And even though desalination may seem like a 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:03.040 niche to some people, there are actually quite a few 0:08:03.040 --> 0:08:07.679 specialties within it. And uh, you know, really thinking through 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:10.160 how the brine is going back into the ocean and 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:13.000 how it's going to affect marine life is uh is 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:15.480 quite a science in itself. But you know, there's been 0:08:15.720 --> 0:08:17.720 a ton of progress on that really in just the 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:20.880 last ten years. And you know, I think in nearly 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:23.920 all cases we're now able to come up with with 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:27.400 special schemes and and the right technology to blend up 0:08:27.400 --> 0:08:31.480 without harming marine life. Fantastic. Hey there it's Jathan from 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:34.719 two thousand nineteen. We're gonna take a break from this 0:08:34.880 --> 0:08:47.240 salt extravaganza and here from our sponsor. Well, moving on 0:08:47.280 --> 0:08:52.160 to another question. What what's the greatest barrier to adoption 0:08:52.280 --> 0:08:57.280 of desalination? I mean, why, uh, what's keeping this technology 0:08:57.440 --> 0:09:00.520 from being more widespread and used in more areas of 0:09:00.520 --> 0:09:03.760 the world. You know, I think there are you know, 0:09:03.760 --> 0:09:06.640 you could probably classify it into two different barriers. One 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:11.360 of one of them is, uh is more perception. Uh. 0:09:11.400 --> 0:09:14.480 You know, there are some areas where the public still 0:09:15.120 --> 0:09:17.920 isn't really that on board with it yet, just for 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:20.880 you know, things they've read in the news and their 0:09:20.920 --> 0:09:23.719 own ideas about it. Other parts of the world are 0:09:23.720 --> 0:09:27.760 doing this uh often uh you know, in the Middle 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:30.600 East or in Southeast Asia. You find de cell plants 0:09:30.640 --> 0:09:34.360 all over the place. They have largely solved all the 0:09:34.440 --> 0:09:38.640 environmental issues that people should be worried about. Um. You know, 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:40.959 but some people are slower to adapt than others, and 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:43.920 it takes a while to to come to terms with 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:48.000 with some of that mentally. UM. So that you know, 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:50.400 that's a harder problem to solve. The easier problems to 0:09:50.440 --> 0:09:53.200 solve really are are the energy problems, because when you 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:56.920 do desalination, it isn't the cheapest way to get water. 0:09:57.080 --> 0:10:00.480 If there's other uh supplies of water of alable to 0:10:00.559 --> 0:10:03.600 you uh that don't have so much salt in them, 0:10:03.720 --> 0:10:07.400 they're most likely going to be less expensive than desalination. 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:10.960 So today people are doing desalination really only in areas 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:14.360 where they don't have a lot of other alternatives, where 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:16.480 they're in a water scarce area and they simply need 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:20.320 to do it. So driving down the energy cost is 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:24.120 really the primary goal and desalination it has been for 0:10:24.600 --> 0:10:27.679 the last twenty years, and there have been a lot 0:10:27.720 --> 0:10:32.200 of different improvements over the last really fifteen years that 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:35.120 have really made progress in driving that down UH, and 0:10:35.160 --> 0:10:38.720 they're in a number of different areas. Obviously, the amount 0:10:38.720 --> 0:10:41.520 of energy that you need to drive the salt out 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:44.319 of the water is a big deal, and you can 0:10:44.320 --> 0:10:48.040 lower that through advances in the membrane chemistry, so actually 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:51.560 improving the membranes. You can do it through advances in 0:10:51.600 --> 0:10:54.880 the efficiencies of pumps UH, and you can also do 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:58.599 it through advances in energy recovery devices. So there's a 0:10:58.840 --> 0:11:00.680 you know, a number of different area is that that 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:02.880 people are working on. And then in addition to that, 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:06.520 you know, simply the operation of these plants, you know, 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:11.120 it requires a the amount of of manpower just to 0:11:11.200 --> 0:11:13.560 keep these things running. So we've also been making a 0:11:13.559 --> 0:11:17.400 lot of improvements and innovations and the pre treatment to 0:11:17.480 --> 0:11:20.920 these plants. So as as the pre treatment to the 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:24.080 water gets better, they're lower operating costs as well. So 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:26.920 lots of different levers to pull in order to lower 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:29.320 the operating costs. You know, I was wondering a little 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:32.439 bit about the equipment itself. I mean, the process itself 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:36.560 seems pretty uh, pretty straightforward, but um, you know, is 0:11:36.559 --> 0:11:38.800 the is the equipment itself large? Does it take up 0:11:38.800 --> 0:11:40.679 a lot of space or or does it require a 0:11:40.720 --> 0:11:44.000 lot of high pressure to to make it work? Yeah, 0:11:44.160 --> 0:11:47.400 the two different things. In terms of size. It doesn't 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:51.400 take up really any more space than a traditional water 0:11:51.440 --> 0:11:55.000 treatment plant for the same capacity would. But the big 0:11:55.000 --> 0:11:59.880 difference is pressure. The more salt that you have dissolved 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:02.920 in any in any given amount of water, the higher 0:12:02.960 --> 0:12:06.920 the osmotic pressure of that water, something Jonathan referred to 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:11.120 in his earlier explanation. So the more salt, higher the 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:15.160 osmotic pressure, the more pressure you need to apply to 0:12:15.280 --> 0:12:19.560 the water to drive the salt out of it. So 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:23.719 take for example, the Middle East in the Gulf, in 0:12:23.760 --> 0:12:26.200 the Middle East, that's really some of the saltiest water 0:12:26.240 --> 0:12:30.880 in the world. So on detail plants, they're running them 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:35.640 as high as as eighty p s I, which is 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:40.280 pretty high pressure. Uh. In other parts of the world, 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:43.959 like say the Caribbean, the water is a little less salty, 0:12:44.240 --> 0:12:47.720 still absolutely seawater, but it's not quite as stalin as 0:12:47.880 --> 0:12:50.719 as the Middle East. So there you because it has 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:54.400 slightly less salt, you can use slightly less less pressure. Now, 0:12:54.520 --> 0:12:59.280 are these plants often um sort of piggybacked onto other 0:12:59.360 --> 0:13:02.120 plants like pour generation. I was wondering if there was 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:06.240 a lot of cogeneration going on with desalination plants. Yeah, 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:09.280 that's a great question. Uh. And this is actually one 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:12.440 of the reasons that g is is uh, you know, 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:15.720 so active in this market. Uh. You know, there's just 0:13:15.800 --> 0:13:20.200 an inex Uh. There's a there's a obvious tie between 0:13:20.320 --> 0:13:23.600 energy and water. So to produce energy, you know, power 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:26.920 plants need water to produce energy. In fact, almost ten 0:13:27.000 --> 0:13:30.680 percent of all global water withdrawals go to the production 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:33.760 of water, so it's a pretty significant amount. Uh. And 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:38.160 then the reverse of that is to desalinate water, you 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:41.200 need energy to do it. So power plants and deesel 0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:45.680 plants are are are very linked. In the past, when 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:50.400 the technologies were more thermal based, that was another advantage 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:55.000 of tying the plants together because many power plants, especially 0:13:55.000 --> 0:13:57.240 power plants in the past, had a lot of waste heat, 0:13:57.280 --> 0:14:01.080 so they could use some of that heat uh for 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:04.800 the thermal desalination. Power Plants today are much more efficient, 0:14:04.880 --> 0:14:08.040 so there isn't so much waste heat coming from them. Uh. 0:14:08.080 --> 0:14:10.920 And the membrane technologies come to a point where really 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:14.640 that's the propol and technology for desalination. So we're not 0:14:14.679 --> 0:14:17.640 seeing them tied together as much anymore because of waste 0:14:17.640 --> 0:14:20.280 heat from the power plant, but we are seeing them 0:14:20.280 --> 0:14:23.920 tied together simply because the power plant needs water, uh 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:28.880 and the decail plant needs power. Excellent. Hi, it's Jonathan 0:14:28.920 --> 0:14:32.000 two nineteen again. I decided that I needed to get 0:14:32.000 --> 0:14:34.960 a little salt, so I came back to visit this episode. 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:45.560 While I'm doing that, let's take another quick break. So 0:14:45.840 --> 0:14:49.120 what is ge doing to make desalination more feasible to 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.680 address water scarcity issues? So we're working in a number 0:14:52.680 --> 0:14:55.640 of different areas. We've worked a lot in the past 0:14:55.680 --> 0:14:58.520 on the membranes, and uh, you know, there are really 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:03.200 some very high quality membranes now used in this salimation. Uh, 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:06.000 they're not at entitlement yet. There are still some games 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:09.240 to be made there UM, but they're they're getting close. 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:13.680 The membranes are very efficient today. UM pre treatment is 0:15:13.760 --> 0:15:16.240 very important. So when when we talk about membranes and 0:15:16.280 --> 0:15:18.520 how they take the salt out of water, they're great 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:20.480 at taking the salt out of water, but they aren't 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:23.480 great at taking suspended solids out of water. So you 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:26.880 don't want to put salt or sticks or stones or 0:15:26.880 --> 0:15:29.440 anything like that into a membrane. That's bad for it. 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.000 So pretty much every membrane plant in the world has 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:35.240 some kind of pre treatment in front of it to 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:38.400 take the suspended solids out before it gets to the membranes. 0:15:39.240 --> 0:15:42.200 UH and G has been leading in this area as well. 0:15:42.280 --> 0:15:46.920 We have some terrific advanced prefiltration another type of membrane 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:51.320 called an ultrafiltration membrane, and it it provides really superior 0:15:51.640 --> 0:15:54.760 UH suspended solids removal, so that the water that gets 0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:58.560 to the the reverse us most of the membranes is 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:01.120 as clean as it can be, still salty, but it's 0:16:01.160 --> 0:16:03.400 had everything else removed and that makes the life of 0:16:03.440 --> 0:16:07.960 those membranes last a lot longer, which in turn lowards 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:11.920 the overall cost of ownership. UM. Then the other pieces 0:16:11.880 --> 0:16:14.440 of the pumping side, there are a lot of different 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:17.760 kinds of pumps in the marketplace. The most efficient types 0:16:17.800 --> 0:16:22.160 of pumps are positive displacement pumps. If you think of 0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:25.280 pumping water, you can imagine you have a fixed geogray 0:16:25.560 --> 0:16:28.880 fixed geometry of water. The most efficient way to raise 0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:31.000 the pressure of it is just to push on it 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:36.080 um and that works today in in relatively small sizes, 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:40.200 but as plants get larger and larger um there aren't 0:16:40.640 --> 0:16:45.040 so many good positive displacement pumps. So instead what people 0:16:45.120 --> 0:16:48.160 use their centrifugal pumps. So that's more like spinning the water. 0:16:48.560 --> 0:16:50.960 The water that gets thrown to the outside has a 0:16:51.480 --> 0:16:55.960 higher pressure. So you know, we've been working developing a 0:16:56.040 --> 0:16:59.760 new pump which is a positive displacement style pump, but 0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:03.000 is much larger than other positive displacement style pumps on 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:06.000 the marketplace. That's a pretty new product for us, but 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:08.200 we expect that within the next year we're gonna start 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:10.440 seeing more of more of that pump out in de 0:17:10.520 --> 0:17:13.520 cel plan and that's going to knock as much as 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:18.720 another ten percent of the energy off, so that when 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:22.080 we get that fully commercialized, not in the marketplace, it's 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:25.600 gonna lower the electrical costs by about ten percent more, 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:29.080 which is really significant when you're talking about, you know, 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:32.800 the cost of desalination. Sure. So, so that's sort of 0:17:32.840 --> 0:17:36.439 leads into what do you see as the future of desalination? 0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:39.359 Where do you see us going in another few years, 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:42.160 like another decade or two decades. Yeah, that's a great 0:17:42.240 --> 0:17:45.400 question and a hard question because there are many many 0:17:45.480 --> 0:17:49.160 technologies out there today. Uh. You know, I I think 0:17:49.280 --> 0:17:54.320 most people in the industry, myself included, really see reverse 0:17:54.359 --> 0:18:00.000 osmosis as continuing to be the most prevalent technology, uh 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:04.280 for at least the next five or seven or ten years. Um. 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:08.119 It's certainly possible that some other technologies could could come along. 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:10.760 And you know, honestly, if there are other technologies that 0:18:10.760 --> 0:18:13.439 will dramatically lower the cost of desalination, that would be 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:16.199 great for the planet. Um. But I you know, I 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:18.240 think over the next five or seven years, what we're 0:18:18.240 --> 0:18:21.760 going to see is people figuring out how to link 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:27.000 the cell plants more to other renewables. So already we're 0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:30.600 starting to see people thinking about how do you combine 0:18:30.600 --> 0:18:34.240 a de cell plant with wind turbines and a wind farm, 0:18:34.520 --> 0:18:38.000 or how do you combine a de cell plant with 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:41.119 a solar farm. You know, it turns out that a 0:18:41.119 --> 0:18:45.479 lot of places in the world but neat desalination, places 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:48.560 that are water scarce, are also places that have quite 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:52.000 a bit of sun. So there there's some nice natural 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:55.960 links between, you know, combining solar with de cell. In 0:18:56.040 --> 0:18:59.480 some ways, there's also challenges because you know, in addition 0:18:59.520 --> 0:19:01.840 to having a sun, you know, some of these places 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:04.600 also have a lot of sand and it's dusty and 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:07.880 and dust and solar don't don't always hair so well. 0:19:07.960 --> 0:19:10.680 The dust coats the panels and they become less efficient. 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:14.560 But you know, now we're talking about some pretty um 0:19:14.800 --> 0:19:18.639 discreet challenges. You know, people are doing this now, they're learning, 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:21.000 they're getting better at it. There's not a lot of 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:24.240 solar plus D cell or wind plus D sell out 0:19:24.280 --> 0:19:26.399 there today, but I think in the next five to 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:28.280 ten years we're probably gonna start to feel a lot 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:31.640 more about Yeah, it's really exciting and to give our 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:35.199 listeners an idea of the impact that these sort of 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:39.760 technologies have made so far. Uh, it wasn't that long 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:45.000 ago that the estimated population that could not get access 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:49.119 to clean water was around twenty but according to the 0:19:49.119 --> 0:19:52.080 World Health organization. They had a two thousand twelve report 0:19:52.119 --> 0:19:55.640 which took numbers from and took a look at that. 0:19:56.240 --> 0:19:59.080 They said that it's is still a massive problem. Still 0:19:59.160 --> 0:20:03.080 s million people lack access to safe drinking water, according 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:05.840 to this report, and that's a you know, that's a 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:10.560 sobering number. But the silver lining here is that that's 0:20:10.680 --> 0:20:14.000 that's half of what it was before, so that the 0:20:14.080 --> 0:20:17.520 numbers of people who are getting access to safe drinking water, 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:20.119 they're on the rise, which I mean, that's obviously the 0:20:20.119 --> 0:20:22.840 way we want to see this trend go. So it's 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:26.159 exciting to see this sort of technology combined with the 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:30.879 efforts of other organizations out there dedicated to making sure 0:20:31.000 --> 0:20:35.120 that that people across the world get access to this water. Yeah. 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:38.040 I couldn't agree more. You know, one of the statistics 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:41.160 that that I often hear is that today it's one 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:44.720 and every six people today doesn't have access to clean water, 0:20:45.080 --> 0:20:50.000 which is, as you said, really a sobering number. Um. 0:20:50.119 --> 0:20:54.080 You know, I I think there's an interesting combination here 0:20:54.119 --> 0:20:57.159 where you read a lot about this today. You know, 0:20:57.320 --> 0:21:01.320 ten years ago you didn't generally see water articles in 0:21:01.440 --> 0:21:04.800 mainstream media, and today, you know, every week you're going 0:21:04.840 --> 0:21:09.880 to see an article in mainstream media talking about water scarcity, 0:21:10.040 --> 0:21:12.320 and you know, it is a serious problem and it 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:18.840 is alarming. But the plus side of this publicity is 0:21:18.880 --> 0:21:24.080 that they're more entrepreneurs, more large companies like GE, just 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:26.639 more people out there starting to think about what are 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:29.960 some possible solutions, uh, And there's lots of them. You know. 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:33.320 Desalination is a great example of ways that we can 0:21:33.320 --> 0:21:37.480 solve water scarcity. Water reuse is another great example of 0:21:37.520 --> 0:21:40.520 ways that we can solve water scarcity. Water reuse is 0:21:40.560 --> 0:21:44.040 just taking water that's already been used for one purpose, uh, 0:21:44.040 --> 0:21:46.480 and treating it and cleaning it up and finding a 0:21:47.119 --> 0:21:49.840 way to use it for another purpose. So, you know, 0:21:50.080 --> 0:21:52.960 I think all the current press that we hear about 0:21:52.960 --> 0:21:57.119 water scarcity is actually helping to feed a pipeline of 0:21:57.480 --> 0:22:00.119 new innovations and new ideas that will actually helps all 0:22:00.200 --> 0:22:05.080 the problems in the long run. Fantastic, Eric, Uh. That 0:22:05.080 --> 0:22:08.800 that's a great look at the desalination process and what 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:12.120 g E is doing to to really push this technology forward. 0:22:12.520 --> 0:22:15.239 And we really appreciate you coming on the show and 0:22:15.280 --> 0:22:18.840 talking with us. It's been a really educational experience for 0:22:18.920 --> 0:22:24.880 me and especially as as as liberal arts majors whose 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:28.359 whose background and engineering is saying, Wow, that's cool. Uh, 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:30.399 it's really great to get people like you on our 0:22:30.440 --> 0:22:33.000 show to talk about this and and give our listeners 0:22:33.040 --> 0:22:36.440 this uh this sort of Uh look, is there anything 0:22:36.520 --> 0:22:39.120 else you would like to say before we wrap up? Well, 0:22:39.359 --> 0:22:41.840 you know, Jonathan Chris, I'd just like to say thanks, 0:22:41.920 --> 0:22:44.360 thanks for having me on the show. Um. You know, 0:22:44.720 --> 0:22:47.399 at ge we're doing a lot of really interesting and 0:22:47.440 --> 0:22:50.439 innovative things to solve the very problems that we were 0:22:50.440 --> 0:22:53.320 just talking about for the last half hour. Uh. You know, 0:22:53.400 --> 0:22:56.360 one of the great things about being in this kind 0:22:56.359 --> 0:22:59.280 of business is when you come up with innovations, you 0:22:59.320 --> 0:23:02.159 can actually see you that they're helping people. Uh. So 0:23:02.440 --> 0:23:04.439 you know, it's it's a rewarding business to be and 0:23:05.359 --> 0:23:08.919 Geez very committed to it. We're investing a lot and 0:23:09.040 --> 0:23:12.560 solving problems today and in the future, and and uh, 0:23:12.680 --> 0:23:15.120 you know, I love talking about it and I'm really 0:23:15.119 --> 0:23:17.080 excited about where this can all go over the next 0:23:17.080 --> 0:23:21.119 couple of years. And that wraps up this classic episode 0:23:21.240 --> 0:23:24.760 of tech Stuff where we learned all about desalination. There's 0:23:24.760 --> 0:23:26.960 been a lot more work on that over the last 0:23:26.960 --> 0:23:30.480 few years and maybe I'll do a follow up episode 0:23:30.880 --> 0:23:35.359 to talk about this and the challenges around desalination and 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:39.320 how we need to really be cognizant of those challenges 0:23:39.359 --> 0:23:45.000 before we pursue desalination on a grand scale. It turns 0:23:45.000 --> 0:23:47.160 out it's a lot more complicated than just taking salt 0:23:47.160 --> 0:23:51.640 out of water. I hope you guys uh enjoyed the episode. 0:23:51.640 --> 0:23:54.919 If you have suggestions for future topics for tech Stuff, 0:23:55.280 --> 0:23:57.879 feel free to reach out to me the email addresses 0:23:57.920 --> 0:24:00.879 tech stuff at how stuff works dot com, or pop 0:24:00.880 --> 0:24:04.520