WEBVTT - TechStuff Gets Thirsty 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:07.280 Get in test with technology with text stuff from how 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:15.280 stuff dot com. Hey there, every one, welcome to text Stuff. 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:19.000 I'm Jonathan Strickland and I'm Lauren voc Obama, and today's 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:23.400 episode comes to you courtesy of a little listener mail 0:00:25.520 --> 0:00:27.560 that's going old school, Lauren, and we don't have the 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:30.760 clacks and necessarily, unless Noel decides to get super creative 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:33.640 with this one, I'm looking over. He's giving me nothing 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:38.120 back put in a very quiet clack, maybe a gentle 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:40.960 Long time listeners know what I'm talking about. You guys 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:44.559 who joined fairly recently, let's just say we spared you. 0:00:44.600 --> 0:00:48.160 But anyway, this listener mail actually came from Valerie, who 0:00:48.240 --> 0:00:50.720 sent us an email and said, I would like to 0:00:50.720 --> 0:00:53.640 suggest an episode on city water systems. I think how 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:55.880 different countries are creating a fish and water systems, and 0:00:55.920 --> 0:00:58.120 also the system that's used in Las Vegas could be 0:00:58.120 --> 0:01:01.480 interesting for a podcast. So many both so little potable water, 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:05.040 what is in our future? And we agree this would 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:08.040 be an awesome episode. So we suggested it to other people, 0:01:08.080 --> 0:01:12.040 but they said we should do it. Yeah weird, Actually, 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:14.080 I I guess we we We have talked about this 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:16.640 a tiny bit over on forward thinking, which is a 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:18.800 thing that I think we've been saying a lot lately 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.320 on the show. Yeah. Yeah, And the Forward Thinking episodes 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:26.399 are in a lot of ways very closely related to 0:01:26.400 --> 0:01:28.640 tech stuff because we're looking into the future now. Not 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:32.319 all of Forward Thinking's topics are technology topics. Some of 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:36.800 them are social or cultural or have our more science 0:01:36.800 --> 0:01:40.320 oriented than tech oriented. But if you enjoy the show, 0:01:40.680 --> 0:01:43.000 chances are you to enjoy that show too, especially since 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:46.400 two of the three hosts of that show are this show. 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:49.360 So just saying well, well, we'll let you do the 0:01:49.400 --> 0:01:51.400 math on that one. Um. But yeah, So, so we 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:55.400 wanted to do this episode on the infrastructure systems that 0:01:55.480 --> 0:02:00.640 exist today and historically and some of the things that 0:02:00.680 --> 0:02:04.960 we are thinking about for that incredible and slightly terrifying future. Right, So, 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:08.080 first of all, let's talk about why is it challenging 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:12.120 to get clean water? Um? Lots of reasons, Lots lots 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:15.760 of reasons. Rain doesn't fall everywhere all the time that 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:20.600 people want to live. Um. Rivers don't flow everywhere all 0:02:20.600 --> 0:02:23.200 the time people want to live. Sometimes river courses can 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:27.560 change over time. Yeah, Um, the climate is kind of changing. 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:32.000 That's that's a thing. That's happening. Um. And basically, even 0:02:32.040 --> 0:02:37.240 though it's really expensive to create an upgrade infrastructure, UM, 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:41.560 it's way more expensive to repair damage caused by failed 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:45.440 infrastructure and or to just not let people have water. Um. 0:02:45.480 --> 0:02:47.880 We don't last all that long without that stuff. So 0:02:48.240 --> 0:02:50.080 when we get a little further into this episode, you're 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:52.680 going to realize, like, you know, some of the some 0:02:52.760 --> 0:02:55.880 of the systems out there are a little little on 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:59.600 the elderly side. Yeah, and really, not not upgrading your 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:03.520 infrast structure is like playing chicken with entropy, because systems 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:07.679 break down, they do. And if you yeah, yeah, exactly, 0:03:07.720 --> 0:03:10.600 and some of these systems look like it's, you know, 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:12.920 just a true mishmash because you know, as we know, 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:15.720 cities grow over time, some of them don't, some of 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:18.840 them decrease in size, but in general you see population 0:03:18.919 --> 0:03:22.160 growth the change exactly. So and even if they do decrease, 0:03:22.280 --> 0:03:24.160 that's another thing that you have to you have to 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:26.679 adjust for. Yeah, So you get you get all these 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:30.760 different types of add ons to existing infrastructure. That means 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:34.240 that not everything is the same. You might have, uh, 0:03:34.280 --> 0:03:37.680 you know, four or five different generations of pipes in 0:03:37.880 --> 0:03:43.120 one city's infrastructure, and you know, the more complexity you add, 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:45.920 the more likely something somewhere along the line is not 0:03:46.000 --> 0:03:49.280 going to work the way you had anticipated. In other words, 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:51.840 stuff's gonna break and then you gotta fix it. But 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:55.880 let's let's take a look back, way back. Yeah, because 0:03:55.920 --> 0:03:59.120 a lot of the basic principles upon which we have 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:02.080 based in our most modern systems on go back to 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:06.760 how far Roman times really? Yeah, so the Romans. You 0:04:06.800 --> 0:04:09.600 may have heard about the Roman aqueducts and you might think, uh, 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:14.560 is that a hockey team. No, it's not that hockey team. Yeah, 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:18.080 I would too, centurions on on skates would be awesome. 0:04:18.960 --> 0:04:23.320 But uh so the aqueducts were a system of channels 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:28.719 waterways that would bring water from distant places to Rome 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:30.920 because Rome was a city that was growing much too 0:04:31.000 --> 0:04:34.720 large to be supplied by the local water sources. And 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:38.599 mostly the most famous aqueducts are the ones that you see. 0:04:38.600 --> 0:04:41.440 They look like bridges from a distance. They're elevated. They're 0:04:41.440 --> 0:04:45.160 built on these these stone columns, but they are not 0:04:45.320 --> 0:04:49.359 bridges for road travel. They're actually water bridges. They allow 0:04:49.440 --> 0:04:51.719 water to flow, and the reason why they're elevated is 0:04:51.760 --> 0:04:53.720 because in order to make a pathway from the water 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:57.600 source the reservoirs that the Romans were using. It sometimes 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:00.280 meant that they had to cross things like valleys. Well, 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.520 it's really easy to go down a valley if you've 0:05:02.560 --> 0:05:04.720 got water. It's hard to make the water go back 0:05:04.800 --> 0:05:06.560 up the other side of the valley, right. It would 0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:08.440 have to be going pretty fast because the way that 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:11.480 gravity works, and most most of the time things want 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.240 to go downwards and not upward. You would just have 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:17.440 created a river in that valley as opposed to making 0:05:17.480 --> 0:05:21.360 the water go across. So by doing this aqueduct, if 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:26.320 you could have a kind of continuous grade so that 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:29.640 it was always going a little lower in elevation than 0:05:29.680 --> 0:05:33.400 the earlier sections, you could induce water to flow. You're 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:37.480 letting gravity do the work for you. So the Roman 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:40.280 system had all these aqueducts, and most of them were 0:05:40.279 --> 0:05:43.760 actually channels that were cut underneath the ground. Uh there 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:46.680 there are quite a few aqueducts that you can see 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:49.919 that are built up in their amazing feats of engineering. 0:05:50.400 --> 0:05:53.640 But I think even more amazing to me anyway, as 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:56.120 the thought of all these under yeah, these channels that 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.200 have been cut into the living rock so that water 0:05:59.279 --> 0:06:03.200 can flow through it. Um, and so the water would 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:06.200 flow all the way toward Rome, and then they would 0:06:06.279 --> 0:06:10.480 direct it into giant cisterns, which are just enormous containers, right, 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:13.120 a big old container that can hold water. And these 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:17.680 cisterns would be in the tallest areas around Rome where 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:20.120 the water could still flow into, right, and then a 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:22.560 network of I believe they were using lead pipes at 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:25.480 the time, which was turned out to be problematic. They 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:27.760 were a little blind to the problems at the time. 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:32.279 Um when I would direct the water from from those 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:36.400 cisterns into into homes and fountains and other buildings, yep, 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:39.680 they would they would run these pipes down through the 0:06:39.760 --> 0:06:42.600 various parts of Rome so that you could get access 0:06:42.680 --> 0:06:46.560 to clean water easily, so you wouldn't have to trek 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:49.440 far like you know, because before this kind of system, 0:06:49.680 --> 0:06:52.159 the basic way you got water was you walked to 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:55.320 the closest source of water, took you and you went 0:06:55.360 --> 0:06:58.359 to some water yep, whether that was a river or 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:01.479 a lake or a well know, something like that, and 0:07:01.520 --> 0:07:03.360 then you would bring that back and when you were 0:07:03.360 --> 0:07:05.479 out you had to go back out again. This was 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:09.880 trying to make that much more accessible now. In total, 0:07:09.920 --> 0:07:13.920 they're about two hundred sixty miles worth of aqueducts around 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:17.280 the city of Rome, which is pretty phenomenal. Bad for 0:07:17.320 --> 0:07:20.920 a few thousand years ago. Yeah, and uh, they know 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.560 it was a pretty effective system. They let the gravity 0:07:23.640 --> 0:07:25.800 do the work for them. They didn't have to build 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:29.560 uh lots of pumping stations, although they did have some, 0:07:30.080 --> 0:07:32.600 but they didn't have to have as many as you 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:34.880 would think they'd need because they were latying. Gravity do 0:07:35.000 --> 0:07:37.680 most of the work for them. Uh. And in fact, 0:07:38.200 --> 0:07:41.560 that basic idea of letting gravity do a lot of 0:07:41.600 --> 0:07:45.080 the work for you still applies today. Oh yeah, I've 0:07:45.120 --> 0:07:47.360 been in buildings in New York where that's basically how 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:49.280 the water pressure works. They've got a water tower on 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:52.880 top of the building, and depending on on what level 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:55.880 you're on, you get better pressure because of how far 0:07:55.880 --> 0:07:59.320 it's falling. My favorite is when you use the sinks 0:07:59.480 --> 0:08:02.840 in this building and occasionally you get the sputtering noise 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:07.080 where it sounds like a a giant ball of cobras 0:08:07.200 --> 0:08:09.960 is just on the other side of the faucet. Um. 0:08:10.040 --> 0:08:12.080 You must use the specialist think I don't actually get 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:16.840 I'd show you, but you can't go into that room. 0:08:16.920 --> 0:08:20.360 So let's talk about a couple of other pre industrial 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:23.320 civilizations besides the Romans, because you'd think, well, were they 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:25.840 the only ones who came up with this idea, And 0:08:25.880 --> 0:08:28.920 the answer to that is no, No. Other other civilizations 0:08:28.960 --> 0:08:32.040 knew that gravity worked. Yeah. Yeah, they didn't necessarily know 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:34.320 the mechanism of it or what it was, but they 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:36.839 knew that, hey, if you drop something, it falls, and 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:40.400 that if you if you look at water, it runs downhill, 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:44.319 not uphill. So you know, drawing those conclusions, you figure 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:46.200 out that you need to get water to this place 0:08:46.280 --> 0:08:48.000 where a lot of people live, because it turns out 0:08:48.040 --> 0:08:51.559 we need water. London was one of these places. London 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:55.960 built what is called the Great Conduit, which was another 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:00.640 massive channel that uh that brought water in to London, 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:03.480 actually to cheapside, two cisterns and cheapside that were then 0:09:03.720 --> 0:09:06.640 hooked up to other cisterns around the city. And if 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:10.720 you were rich, you could afford to pay to have 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:13.600 pipes brought into your home so that you would have 0:09:13.679 --> 0:09:17.840 running water in your home. If you weren't rich, sometimes 0:09:17.880 --> 0:09:21.360 you would try and tap into a neighbor's pipes, which 0:09:21.400 --> 0:09:25.640 could get you arrested or stealing water. Yeah, I imagine 0:09:25.679 --> 0:09:28.640 that that also must with the system in ways that 0:09:28.760 --> 0:09:31.520 made nobody happy. Yeah, you know, nothing like having an 0:09:31.640 --> 0:09:35.720 enormous leak appearing where you did not expect one to um. 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:38.680 But yeah, that this was something that London started working 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:41.400 on in the in the thirteenth century. In the mid 0:09:41.440 --> 0:09:46.040 twelve hundreds, I heard that Constantinople, Constantinople not stand bull. 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:51.040 Why they changed it, I can't say, but Constantinople also yeah, 0:09:51.080 --> 0:09:55.520 they created a man made river, so again kind of 0:09:55.559 --> 0:09:58.320 like the aqueduct system of Rome, but more of a 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:02.240 river than an aqueduct um. And it was allowed to 0:10:02.400 --> 0:10:05.720 carry water both above and below ground. They had sections 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:09.080 where again it was they had cut channels into the 0:10:09.120 --> 0:10:13.080 ground and the water would flow through there, and it 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:18.080 was carrying water from about two fifty kilometers away from 0:10:18.160 --> 0:10:20.520 the city. Like the water source for the city was 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:25.319 two kilometers away. Now, when you look at this, like 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:28.319 when you look at most cities, like you look at 0:10:28.320 --> 0:10:31.840 the if you look at a map of ancient civilizations, 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:33.840 for example, and you look at where the cities are located, 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:37.000 they're usually right around water sources, fresh water sources. Because 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:40.600 that was the most effective way of doing it. Yeah, so, uh, 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:43.760 you know, it's it's only fairly recently that we've gotten 0:10:43.800 --> 0:10:46.840 to a point where if you live really far away 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:50.800 from fresh water sources, you can build a large city. 0:10:51.080 --> 0:10:56.040 We've had smaller you know, smaller uh, towns and villages 0:10:56.120 --> 0:10:59.679 and populations, nomadic tribes, things like that, that we're able 0:10:59.760 --> 0:11:03.760 to exist on smaller sources of fresh water. But obviously, 0:11:03.800 --> 0:11:05.360 if you if you want to have a city of 0:11:05.400 --> 0:11:08.079 any size, you need access to a lot of water, 0:11:08.200 --> 0:11:09.920 all right, And this can this can be a very 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:13.920 large problem. For for example, Singapore up until very recently 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:16.680 had to basically import all of their water from Malaysia. 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:21.640 And uh yeah, it's it's ended up springing up a 0:11:21.640 --> 0:11:23.319 whole industry that I'm going to talk about in another 0:11:23.320 --> 0:11:26.720 few minutes here. But um so it's so okay, um 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:30.199 in terms of in terms of our modern water infrastructure, 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:32.240 if you want to, you want to talk about that 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:34.560 a little bit. You're you're tired of the ancient world. 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.240 I understand, Lauren. I understand you don't want to dwell 0:11:37.240 --> 0:11:40.720 in the past. I couldn't agree more, mostly because my 0:11:40.800 --> 0:11:43.160 notes are out. I'm done with all the ancient stuff. 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:45.160 I don't have any other cities that can talk about, Lauren. 0:11:45.200 --> 0:11:47.080 So I am ready to move into the future with 0:11:47.160 --> 0:11:51.360 you boldly, yes and forcibly, where no man has gone before. 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:55.240 No one. Sorry, sorry forgot about the next generation an 0:11:55.280 --> 0:11:58.240 old school. A lot lots of people are in the 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:01.480 these are modern times. That's not not like no one 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:04.000 has ever been here. We're here, that's true. Okay, So 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:07.600 let's talk about your your basic modern water system. It's 0:12:07.720 --> 0:12:10.959 not that different in the sense that most of them 0:12:11.000 --> 0:12:14.920 tend to still rely heavily on gravity. Note pun intended. 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:17.880 I didn't realize I was making one until I was done. 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:21.280 Uh not, not all of them do. Some water systems 0:12:21.400 --> 0:12:25.640 use uh electric pumps and will just pump the water 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:28.560 to maintain the right kind of water pressure for their populations. 0:12:28.600 --> 0:12:30.959 But more frequently than not, you're gonna see water towers, 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:33.960 particularly things like small towns. You'll you'll usually see as 0:12:33.960 --> 0:12:36.480 you're going around the outskirts, you see that enormous tower 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:40.360 and you think, wow, you know, what is the point 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:43.280 of that? Why do you have this big tower just 0:12:43.440 --> 0:12:46.080 holding water there? And if you're in a city, like 0:12:46.160 --> 0:12:49.240 you said, Lauren, you might see on the rooftops, different 0:12:50.120 --> 0:12:54.199 individual water towers. Yeah, so what is going on here, Well, 0:12:54.200 --> 0:12:57.640 it's the same principle. You put the water at an 0:12:57.640 --> 0:13:01.520 elevated location, and by that elevate location, the weight of 0:13:01.559 --> 0:13:04.880 the water is providing the pressure you need to provide 0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:09.319 the However, many households that water tower serves or businesses 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:12.080 or whatever, um with the right amount of water pressure 0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:15.360 so that when you turn on the faucet water comes out. Now. Um, 0:13:15.800 --> 0:13:20.920 your basic water tower is able to hold somewhere between 0:13:21.000 --> 0:13:23.400 I don't know, twoe or fifty thousand gallons of water 0:13:23.480 --> 0:13:26.520 to maybe five hundred thousand or more gallons of water 0:13:26.800 --> 0:13:30.800 at it at a time, so big capacity. Can keep 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:33.400 in mind that your average swimming pool holds fifteen to 0:13:33.480 --> 0:13:36.600 twenty thousand gallons of water, so working more water than 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:40.600 pretty big, not small, big lots of water and um 0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:45.199 usually they are attached to some sort of well always 0:13:45.240 --> 0:13:47.760 are attached to some sort of pumping station which can 0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:51.240 pump water back up into the tower as well as 0:13:51.440 --> 0:13:55.080 usually provide direct pressure to the community. So the way 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:57.720 this tends to work is one of two ways. You 0:13:57.760 --> 0:13:59.960 can either pump all the water up into the water 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:02.480 tower until it reaches a certain level and then you 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:04.720 just stop. You turn the pump off. That way, you 0:14:04.760 --> 0:14:09.240 can serve energy. That way, the gravity will pull the 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:12.840 water down, and for every foot that that water is elevated, 0:14:12.880 --> 0:14:16.080 you get point four three pounds per square inch of pressure. 0:14:16.440 --> 0:14:20.000 Most cities have between fifty and a hundred p s I. 0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:22.640 So your water tower's height is going to determine what 0:14:22.760 --> 0:14:25.360 that water pressure is. So you've got the pump turned 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:28.360 off the waters in the tower. When you, Lauren, decide 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:30.320 you want to have a tasty drink of water and 0:14:30.320 --> 0:14:33.200 you turn on the faucet, then that allows the water 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:35.960 from that water tower to come down a little bit. 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:37.800 It's pushing all the water through the pipes. You get 0:14:37.840 --> 0:14:40.760 water through your faucet. Everyone's happy, yea, assuming that all 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:45.760 the infrastructure is working properly, right, yes, So that is 0:14:45.800 --> 0:14:48.960 that is the general assumption if the water comes on. Now, Lauren, 0:14:49.040 --> 0:14:51.320 let's say that you decide you want a glass of 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:54.680 water at the same time as everyone else in town 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:57.440 has decided to take showers, flush the toilet, you know, 0:14:57.640 --> 0:15:00.160 turn the faucet on outside for no reason whatsoeb or 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:04.120 water the lawn, wash, the car, et cetera. It's enough 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:07.120 so that the water in the water tower has gone 0:15:07.120 --> 0:15:09.440 down to a level where it is no longer able 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.720 to supply that pressure. That's where the pump kicks in. 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:16.240 The pump is able to continuously supply more water, so 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:19.520 it's reaching the right pressure. It also, when people start 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:21.360 to calm down and decide they're not going to waste 0:15:21.360 --> 0:15:24.280 so much water anymore, or drink it or whatever, it 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:26.960 can start to refill that water tower until it reaches 0:15:27.000 --> 0:15:30.120 the optimum level. Again. Now, there are other systems where 0:15:30.200 --> 0:15:33.200 the water tower is essentially a reserve unit. So the 0:15:33.280 --> 0:15:36.440 water pump is taking water from a reservoir. Could be 0:15:36.480 --> 0:15:37.840 a lake, it could be a river, it could just 0:15:37.880 --> 0:15:42.040 be an artificial reservoir. It's taking water from that reservoir 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:44.880 and pumping it directly to the homes. And then any 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:49.520 time that the demand outstrips the capacity of the water pump, 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:53.880 the water tower is activated and supplements it. So either 0:15:53.960 --> 0:15:56.600 way you have kind of the symbiotic relationship between the 0:15:56.640 --> 0:15:59.200 pump and the tower. Now with the tower, the nice 0:15:59.200 --> 0:16:01.480 thing is, because of gravity, you don't have to add 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:03.560 extra energy into the system to get the water to 0:16:03.560 --> 0:16:04.800 where it needs to go. You don't have to have 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:07.560 all these pumping stations along the lines to keep the 0:16:07.600 --> 0:16:10.440 pressure at the right level. So, you know, we think 0:16:10.480 --> 0:16:12.760 about that for things like telephone lines. When we talked 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:14.840 about the telephone system, how they had to have relay 0:16:14.880 --> 0:16:17.920 stations so that they could boost the signal throughout. The 0:16:18.040 --> 0:16:20.560 same sort of thing with water pressure. Right if eventually, 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:24.280 if you're talking about it long enough, uh pathway that 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:28.640 pressure starts, you're going to lose motion resistance along the 0:16:28.720 --> 0:16:30.760 path and you've got yeah, and you've just got too 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:35.000 much space to fill. So um, these are ways of 0:16:35.040 --> 0:16:38.960 getting around that. So and with the gravity working for you, 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:42.000 you have to spend less energy overall. Pumping the water 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:46.040 up into the tower is more energy efficient because you're 0:16:46.080 --> 0:16:47.680 just filling it up to where it needs to be 0:16:47.760 --> 0:16:51.520 and then you stop, as opposed to consistently pumping water 0:16:51.640 --> 0:16:55.080 to the entire population. So in general, that's how your 0:16:55.160 --> 0:16:59.160 basic water tower works. Uh, it's pretty neat stuff. Actually, 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:02.800 I mean, I know it's it's a really simple system, 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:07.280 but I mean, but that's why it's so elegant. Of course, 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.160 that's not how everyone gets their water, bob. Right, When 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:13.280 you're further out from cities, you you're gonna either need 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:16.560 your own well or um which you are probably going 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.399 to need to use a pump in order to access. Yeah, yeah, exactly. 0:17:19.480 --> 0:17:22.000 So I mean, granted, you could think about the well 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:25.320 pumps there are, you know, the old style pump handle 0:17:25.359 --> 0:17:31.920 where you're literally pumping, but more frequently we have electronic pumps. Now. Yeah. 0:17:32.400 --> 0:17:35.440 Here in the U. S Alone, we've got some sixteen 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.560 million private wells, and we drill another five hundred thousand 0:17:38.600 --> 0:17:42.320 every year. Yeah. And uh so if you live outside 0:17:42.320 --> 0:17:45.760 of the city, um, which I used to. You know, 0:17:46.000 --> 0:17:48.960 I used to live out pretty far out there, then 0:17:49.000 --> 0:17:51.640 you may be using here in Atlanta, living like five 0:17:51.720 --> 0:17:54.680 miles from downtown is considered a little bit outside the city. 0:17:54.760 --> 0:17:57.160 But I'm sure I live in the city now, I'm 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:01.199 within the city limits. So yeah, no, no, you know, 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:03.760 actually outside where you can see the stars and stuff 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:07.480 like that, and cols and and bison occasionally, um, which 0:18:07.480 --> 0:18:10.919 we're totally domesticated. We don't have wild bison in Georgia 0:18:10.960 --> 0:18:14.120 as far as I know. Anyway, if you live out 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:17.440 in the in the sticks, as I would say, which 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:20.320 I used to, then you might have your own well, 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:23.280 or you might have a communal well of some sort. 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:25.680 But the way this works is you end up digging down. 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:29.320 See there's this thing called the water table that exists 0:18:29.440 --> 0:18:34.480 underground and it's pretty much everywhere more or less. But 0:18:34.560 --> 0:18:37.040 you have to dig at different depths depending upon where 0:18:37.080 --> 0:18:40.600 you are right, depending on on how much rainfall a 0:18:40.640 --> 0:18:44.119 location gets, and um the other runoff that kind of stuff, 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:46.400 and you know, lots of things will determine exactly how 0:18:46.440 --> 0:18:48.199 far down you would need to go, and also the 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:50.080 quality of the water. We'll talk about that in a 0:18:50.119 --> 0:18:52.760 second too. But if you happen to live someplace that 0:18:52.920 --> 0:18:56.320 has good aquifers, like freshwater aquifers that are at the 0:18:56.600 --> 0:18:59.840 you can access at the water table, you can dig 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:02.520 a hole and then eventually you know you should hit water. 0:19:02.960 --> 0:19:07.600 And so for example, a shallow well might be or 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:11.400 or less down and with that you could use what's 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:14.120 called a jet pump. What is it jet pump too? 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:17.240 So jet pump, Well, it does is it pumps water? 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:21.280 But the way it does is kind of cool. You're welcome, Yeah, 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:24.120 So yeah, it uses electricity and it uses a little 0:19:24.160 --> 0:19:26.960 bit of water that you already put into the pump. 0:19:26.960 --> 0:19:30.480 It's called to prime the primate. It's drive water is 0:19:30.520 --> 0:19:33.440 what's called. So it's got a little jet, a little 0:19:33.680 --> 0:19:35.280 think of it like a nozzle that you would put 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:37.639 on the end of a hose. And you know, by 0:19:37.680 --> 0:19:41.040 reducing the size of the pathway that the water can 0:19:41.040 --> 0:19:43.960 go through, you also increase the pressure. You put a 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:46.600 little water in it to primate. You turn it on, 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:49.359 it starts to emit this water at high pressure. It 0:19:49.359 --> 0:19:52.880 starts to create a vacuum, right due to the jet 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:55.760 of water flowing out, it creating suction inside the tube, right, 0:19:55.800 --> 0:19:58.399 and the tube goes down into the well until it 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:01.480 hits where the water is actually goes further down than 0:20:01.480 --> 0:20:04.199 that obviously, but then the water gets drawn up the 0:20:04.280 --> 0:20:08.320 tube through that vacuum, yep, and then it gets sent 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:12.560 into a holding tank of some sort. So this isn't 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:14.760 you know. The wells that are being used are not 0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:16.920 something that you know. When you turn on the faucet, 0:20:17.000 --> 0:20:18.720 the well kicks in and then you have to wait 0:20:18.760 --> 0:20:22.800 a while and the water comes out. The pump continues 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:25.480 to work until the water tank reaches its optimum level 0:20:25.520 --> 0:20:27.040 and it turns off and then we'll come back on 0:20:27.119 --> 0:20:29.520 when it when the water is depleted a certain amount, 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:31.440 so that you've kind of got your own little personal 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:35.119 mini water tower. Yeah. And since since you're not necessarily 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:38.080 using gravity, I mean you probably don't have your water 0:20:38.160 --> 0:20:42.840 tank forty feet above your house. Probably not, Yeah, So 0:20:42.920 --> 0:20:45.720 since you probably don't have that one, it uses instead 0:20:45.760 --> 0:20:47.760 in order to create the right amount of pressure that 0:20:47.760 --> 0:20:51.280 you're gonna need for your water. Um. They have uh 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:54.600 an air bladder that's inside the water tank, so it's 0:20:54.600 --> 0:20:58.280 inflated and as you put water in, it compresses that bladder, 0:20:58.320 --> 0:21:01.440 the bladders pushing against the wall water. Um. And then 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:03.239 once the water has hit the right level, and when 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:05.600 you turn on the faucet, the bladder is pressing against 0:21:05.640 --> 0:21:08.200 the water, the water comes out the right pressure until 0:21:08.240 --> 0:21:10.959 the bladder has you know, extended about as far as 0:21:10.960 --> 0:21:12.920 it can. Then the water tank needs to be refilled 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:15.879 by the pump. So that that's your basic system, although 0:21:15.880 --> 0:21:18.199 there are other ones too. If you have a if 0:21:18.200 --> 0:21:20.920 the water table is deeper than a jet pump may 0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:23.440 not be strong enough to create the vacuum necessary to 0:21:23.520 --> 0:21:26.840 pull the water up that height. Because the higher you go, 0:21:26.960 --> 0:21:29.560 the heavier that you know, the more the more energy need, 0:21:30.200 --> 0:21:32.640 the more more exactly, the more work you have to do, 0:21:33.080 --> 0:21:36.359 and so you might have something called a double drop 0:21:36.440 --> 0:21:39.160 jet pump or even a submersible pump, where the pump 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:42.679 itself is under the water as opposed to at the 0:21:42.720 --> 0:21:46.120 top of the well. And in this case you would 0:21:46.119 --> 0:21:49.560 just have another kind of approach to drawing water up 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:53.160 this very long tube and again filling up a tank, 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:57.119 just as you would with the jet pump. So those 0:21:57.200 --> 0:22:00.560 are the other ways of getting water, uh, you know, 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:04.040 the basic ways that you would see in today's world, 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:07.920 at least in the United States, right right, And well, 0:22:08.200 --> 0:22:10.080 you know, a lot of this technology and a lot 0:22:10.080 --> 0:22:13.440 of our infrastructure really has has been in place for 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:16.280 for over a hundred years. UM. A lot of our 0:22:17.119 --> 0:22:20.960 water towers, UM distribution lines, sewer lines, storage facilities, and 0:22:20.960 --> 0:22:24.680 stuff like that were built, uh, basically immediately following World 0:22:24.720 --> 0:22:27.280 War Two. So I mean, so all of this is 0:22:27.280 --> 0:22:29.880 is pretty simple. I mean, personal pumps have have developed 0:22:29.880 --> 0:22:31.639 a little bit and changed a little bit in the 0:22:31.640 --> 0:22:37.119 following decades, but but this technology has has not changed 0:22:37.119 --> 0:22:39.880 in a long time. And what we're saying, and yet 0:22:40.160 --> 0:22:42.320 we've added lots of stuff to it. So this is 0:22:42.320 --> 0:22:45.119 where I'm talking about. How you know, the pipes that 0:22:45.160 --> 0:22:48.720 were used forty years ago are made of different stuff 0:22:48.720 --> 0:22:50.800 and are of different sizes, and the pipes that were 0:22:50.880 --> 0:22:53.200 used thirty years ago which are different from twenty, which 0:22:53.200 --> 0:22:55.200 are different from ten, which are different from today. So 0:22:55.640 --> 0:22:58.280 you've got this system where nothing is homogeneous at all, 0:22:58.400 --> 0:23:00.520 and and there, and the lifespans of all of these 0:23:00.520 --> 0:23:04.120 different products can can depend a lot on the materials 0:23:04.119 --> 0:23:06.800 that they were made from and how how carefully they 0:23:06.800 --> 0:23:10.280 were installed. Not to mention the environment itself. If you 0:23:10.320 --> 0:23:13.040 are in a place like uh, the Great White North 0:23:13.640 --> 0:23:16.920 shout out to all of our Canadian fans, a uh, 0:23:16.960 --> 0:23:19.879 then you know they have to withstand much colder temperatures 0:23:19.920 --> 0:23:23.800 than say, down here in Hot Lanta. I hate myself 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:27.760 for saying, and I didn't even notice for half a second, 0:23:27.760 --> 0:23:31.720 which makes me hate myself more. Well, um, yeah, okay, 0:23:31.760 --> 0:23:34.200 So so in that's that's in the US and other 0:23:34.240 --> 0:23:36.280 parts of the world. I mean, we get we get 0:23:36.600 --> 0:23:40.199 not um not by global standards, a whole lot of 0:23:40.240 --> 0:23:43.080 water per capita here, but we we certainly get a 0:23:43.080 --> 0:23:45.359 lot more than many other places do. Yeah, and there 0:23:45.400 --> 0:23:47.400 are other places that have to get a lot more 0:23:47.440 --> 0:23:50.840 creative with how they manage water, how they get water, 0:23:50.880 --> 0:23:54.800 and how they distribute it. So for example, um, well, 0:23:55.000 --> 0:23:57.439 you know, I could talk about Abu Dhabi really quickly. 0:23:57.480 --> 0:24:00.600 So now Abu Dhabi is is a the that are 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:03.159 the the area of Abu Dhabi is so large and 0:24:03.200 --> 0:24:07.440 so populous, it could not have supported that population, uh 0:24:07.480 --> 0:24:11.600 like a century ago because the water management system just 0:24:11.680 --> 0:24:15.280 wasn't there. The area around Abu Dhabi has only two 0:24:15.359 --> 0:24:20.680 freshwater aquifers. All the other aquifers are salty, that's it's 0:24:20.720 --> 0:24:24.840 like seawater, and that there's no fresh water otherwise to access. 0:24:24.880 --> 0:24:29.240 So they do have wells that they've um drilled down 0:24:29.320 --> 0:24:31.359 so that they can pull up some of the water 0:24:31.480 --> 0:24:35.600 from the freshwater aquifers, but that's almost exclusively used in agriculture. 0:24:36.200 --> 0:24:40.320 Usually almost seventy of fresh water of any given community 0:24:40.359 --> 0:24:42.679 is going to be used for agriculture, right, So in 0:24:42.720 --> 0:24:45.439 this case, what they've decided to do in order to 0:24:45.720 --> 0:24:48.600 supply the population with freshwater is built a lot of 0:24:48.640 --> 0:24:51.639 desalination plants, and we've talked about those in a previous 0:24:51.680 --> 0:24:53.679 episode of tech Stuff. Go back and search if you 0:24:53.720 --> 0:24:56.719 want to look at our discussion. We actually got to 0:24:56.760 --> 0:24:59.359 speak with an expert about the salination plants and how 0:24:59.760 --> 0:25:02.600 they're are different methods of removing salt from seawater so 0:25:02.640 --> 0:25:05.159 you can make it drinkable. Um So that was a 0:25:05.200 --> 0:25:08.600 creative way that they have used to meet the needs 0:25:08.640 --> 0:25:12.159 of their population. Right. And you know, most of the 0:25:12.240 --> 0:25:16.280 United States uh water infrastructure was was built up in 0:25:16.320 --> 0:25:19.080 the midst of the industrial era, when everyone is starting 0:25:19.119 --> 0:25:21.840 to move from urban areas or move i'm sorry, from 0:25:21.880 --> 0:25:25.399 from rural areas to urban areas. And those kind of 0:25:25.400 --> 0:25:28.040 population shifts that we saw in the early to mid 0:25:28.040 --> 0:25:30.320 twentieth century are just happening now in a lot of 0:25:30.359 --> 0:25:34.760 developing countries. So the Third World Center, for for example, 0:25:34.880 --> 0:25:37.720 estimates that there's two billion people without access to safe 0:25:37.760 --> 0:25:42.280 drinking water in Asia alone. That's yeah, it really just 0:25:42.280 --> 0:25:45.560 just depends on on your your rainfall, your river, access, 0:25:45.600 --> 0:25:49.600 your groundwater, all all of those natural resources. Um and 0:25:49.600 --> 0:25:53.960 and for for another example, um Iceland. Okay, let's let's 0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:56.440 if you're talking about the cubic meters of fresh water 0:25:56.760 --> 0:25:59.680 per capita, per per per person in a country. Um 0:25:59.720 --> 0:26:04.440 Iland has about five three thousand cubic meters of water 0:26:05.320 --> 0:26:12.119 freshwater per capita. Okay, Bow rain for example, has three disparity, 0:26:12.280 --> 0:26:16.560 not three thousand, just just three. That's Yeah, so obviously 0:26:16.600 --> 0:26:19.119 you have to get creative with the way that you 0:26:19.280 --> 0:26:23.600 are able to access and distribute water, right. And then 0:26:23.800 --> 0:26:27.560 after you have accessed and distributed that water, Um, you know, 0:26:27.880 --> 0:26:30.239 most people use water to do some stuff and then 0:26:30.240 --> 0:26:32.159 they want it to sort of go away, right, So 0:26:32.200 --> 0:26:34.639 we need to talk about how to reclaim that water 0:26:34.720 --> 0:26:37.040 and what you do with that water once you've used it. 0:26:37.080 --> 0:26:38.960 You know what, I got a great idea. Yeah, let's 0:26:38.960 --> 0:26:40.880 take a quick break to thank our sponsor and we'll 0:26:40.880 --> 0:26:44.000 come back and talk about that. Excellent alright, So just 0:26:44.080 --> 0:26:46.159 before the break, lawn, you brought up a great point. 0:26:46.920 --> 0:26:49.040 You know, we don't just use water to drink. Obviously, 0:26:49.080 --> 0:26:50.960 we use it for all these other sorts of things, 0:26:50.960 --> 0:26:53.840 whether it's taking a shower or washing dishes or in 0:26:53.880 --> 0:26:56.199 the toilets. There are a lot of different ways we 0:26:56.280 --> 0:26:58.480 use it. We might use it to water our lawns. 0:26:58.760 --> 0:27:02.240 And then once we use it, what do we What 0:27:02.359 --> 0:27:04.680 happens then? I mean, it goes down the drain for 0:27:04.760 --> 0:27:06.639 most of these cases, apart from the water in the 0:27:06.720 --> 0:27:09.200 lawn example, but you know it goes down the drain. 0:27:09.280 --> 0:27:12.960 What happens then? Well? Okay, so so following this entire 0:27:13.080 --> 0:27:17.760 gravity model. Um, most of the time waste water waste 0:27:17.800 --> 0:27:20.000 facilities are going to be located in some kind of 0:27:20.040 --> 0:27:23.040 low lying area. Yeah yeah, and it makes sense again 0:27:23.119 --> 0:27:25.600 because that means you let the gravity pull the water 0:27:25.680 --> 0:27:27.359 where it needs to go, so you don't have to 0:27:27.400 --> 0:27:31.520 have pumping stations to keep wastewater going, because then you're 0:27:31.560 --> 0:27:35.120 spending energy just to get rid of wastewater. So yeah, 0:27:35.160 --> 0:27:37.760 you've got you know, the drain systems, whether they're on 0:27:37.800 --> 0:27:40.359 the roads or whether they're in the uh there in 0:27:40.480 --> 0:27:45.000 your house whatever, These all kind of lead to a 0:27:45.040 --> 0:27:49.320 water treatment facility. You've got pipes, you've got sewer tunnels, 0:27:49.680 --> 0:27:52.159 all that fun stuff. You've got the manholes that allow 0:27:52.280 --> 0:27:55.119 people to have access in case they need to to 0:27:55.240 --> 0:27:58.159 do maintenance on any of this system. And it's really good, 0:27:58.200 --> 0:28:00.399 by the way, to have these treatment facilities instead of 0:28:00.400 --> 0:28:04.720 just dumping waste water into into natural rivers, for example, 0:28:04.920 --> 0:28:08.159 because that will therefore, um, you know, allow you to 0:28:08.760 --> 0:28:13.120 not totally pollute your natural rivers, right, and also not 0:28:13.520 --> 0:28:17.240 give a terrible statement to anyone who lives down river 0:28:17.280 --> 0:28:22.520 of you, right exactly have fun drinking stupid. Yeah, that's 0:28:22.560 --> 0:28:25.200 not a great message. Okay, So so the basic the 0:28:25.280 --> 0:28:27.960 basic format of a water treatment facility. All right, so 0:28:28.080 --> 0:28:32.600 um this all right, guys, you know I'm going to 0:28:32.640 --> 0:28:36.159 give you the straight poop on this. There's gonna be 0:28:36.240 --> 0:28:39.760 some potty talk here and uh, you know it's something 0:28:39.800 --> 0:28:41.240 that we need to know about. All right. First, you 0:28:41.320 --> 0:28:43.160 got a screen. Okay, Once you get to the water 0:28:43.200 --> 0:28:46.400 treatment facility, you have you have different levels of water 0:28:46.480 --> 0:28:50.479 purification depending upon the sophistication of the facility. Sure that 0:28:50.520 --> 0:28:52.400 this will occur in several steps. The first is a 0:28:52.480 --> 0:28:56.560 physical step where where you are just just literally screens 0:28:56.840 --> 0:28:59.560 to take solid waste out of your water as much 0:28:59.600 --> 0:29:01.520 of the solid wastes as you can. Now, these screens 0:29:01.560 --> 0:29:04.560 aren't aren't incredibly fine so that they take out all 0:29:05.000 --> 0:29:06.760 particulate matter, but they get a lot of it, a 0:29:06.760 --> 0:29:10.200 lot of the larger solids. Uh. Now, the water that 0:29:10.400 --> 0:29:15.320 is left from that first screening process moves into ponds 0:29:15.480 --> 0:29:17.560 or pools, and then it's allowed to sit there for 0:29:17.600 --> 0:29:20.000 a while so that sediments in the waters start to 0:29:20.040 --> 0:29:24.120 settle into the bottom of that pool. You then end 0:29:24.200 --> 0:29:27.160 up removing that waste that tends to be about half 0:29:27.280 --> 0:29:30.040 of all the waste that's in that water at that moment, 0:29:30.120 --> 0:29:32.840 So it's still there's still quite a bit suspended within 0:29:32.880 --> 0:29:34.960 the water itself. But to get rid of about half 0:29:35.000 --> 0:29:37.760 of it that way, Uh, that's waste you will then 0:29:37.800 --> 0:29:40.400 dispose of either by putting in a landfill or maybe 0:29:40.400 --> 0:29:44.720 in an incinerator. I keep hoping for these plasma generators 0:29:44.720 --> 0:29:47.200 so that you could use it because any organic matter 0:29:47.280 --> 0:29:50.520 you could turn into sin gas, which synthetic gas that 0:29:50.520 --> 0:29:53.280 would actually be a fuel. But mr mr fusion make 0:29:53.320 --> 0:29:56.080 it go. We're still not there yet. So uh, so 0:29:56.360 --> 0:29:58.280 you've gotten rid of about fifty of the waste, that 0:29:58.320 --> 0:30:01.480 means you still got fifty percent left in the water. Uh. 0:30:01.600 --> 0:30:06.719 You then allow that water to be treated with various chemicals, 0:30:06.760 --> 0:30:09.040 mainly chlorine, which is used to kill off a lot 0:30:09.040 --> 0:30:11.160 of harmful bacteria. All right, for your for your very 0:30:11.200 --> 0:30:13.520 basic water treatment, you can then treat it with chemicals 0:30:13.520 --> 0:30:16.080 to get rid of um, anything really nasty that's still 0:30:16.120 --> 0:30:18.440 living in there. Yeah, you might use a little bacteria 0:30:18.520 --> 0:30:20.760 first to eat up any organic matter, and then use 0:30:20.800 --> 0:30:23.040 the chlorine to kill off everything. But then at that 0:30:23.080 --> 0:30:27.120 point you essentially discharge it. Assuming that it's a simple 0:30:27.200 --> 0:30:30.120 water treatment plant. But there are more sophisty ones that 0:30:30.200 --> 0:30:31.880 have more steps. Would you like to know about the 0:30:31.920 --> 0:30:34.880 other steps? Sure? I think that they involve more bacteria, 0:30:34.960 --> 0:30:38.160 don't they do? You start off with some errated tanks 0:30:38.200 --> 0:30:40.760 that hold the water and the bacteria, and that those 0:30:40.760 --> 0:30:44.880 bacteria end up consuming almost all of the waste inside 0:30:44.880 --> 0:30:48.160 that water in fact around it. And that's that's it's 0:30:48.160 --> 0:30:50.240 really cool to me that they that they use gross 0:30:50.240 --> 0:30:52.800 stuff to eat the gross stuff they don't want. And 0:30:52.800 --> 0:30:55.040 then um, but but but but then you need to 0:30:55.080 --> 0:30:58.080 get rid of that first gross stuff, right, Yeah, You 0:30:58.120 --> 0:31:00.600 move the water over into settling tanks, and then you 0:31:00.640 --> 0:31:03.960 remove that bacteria. You can treat the water again with 0:31:04.040 --> 0:31:07.160 chemicals to do that, uh, And by this time you 0:31:07.200 --> 0:31:10.840 are down to just uh, like of all the waste 0:31:10.840 --> 0:31:12.800 that you had had in that water to start with. 0:31:13.280 --> 0:31:15.560 Then you can treat it with other chemicals or remove 0:31:15.640 --> 0:31:18.320 stuff like nitrogen and phosphorus which tend to build up, 0:31:18.600 --> 0:31:21.440 use the chlorine to kill off any of the remaining bacteria, 0:31:21.520 --> 0:31:24.960 and then you discharge the water into whatever. You know. 0:31:25.120 --> 0:31:27.600 Usually it ends up going through some canal systems and 0:31:27.640 --> 0:31:31.360 into another river eventually, but at this point it's, uh, 0:31:31.360 --> 0:31:34.160 it's you know, clean water. I don't know that you 0:31:34.200 --> 0:31:35.800 would necessarily want to stand at the end of it 0:31:35.840 --> 0:31:39.280 with a glass and say yum yum. But maybe maybe not. 0:31:39.320 --> 0:31:41.280 But but it's at least, you know, okay for being 0:31:41.320 --> 0:31:44.680 released into the environment relatively as waste water goes. And 0:31:44.680 --> 0:31:46.760 and to be fair, I mean, there's I want to 0:31:46.800 --> 0:31:48.680 address this because it's just one of those things that 0:31:48.680 --> 0:31:51.040 occurred to me. I don't mean to suggest that water 0:31:51.080 --> 0:31:53.760 it can hold on to certain attributes just because it 0:31:53.800 --> 0:31:56.880 came into contact with something, because that's not the case. 0:31:57.640 --> 0:31:59.960 I mean really, technically, we're all we're all running around 0:32:00.040 --> 0:32:04.480 drinking dino blood, right. Yeah, So that's your basic approach 0:32:04.520 --> 0:32:07.560 is essentially going through this multi step process to remove waste. 0:32:07.640 --> 0:32:10.520 And and by basic, we mean this is actually very complex, 0:32:10.680 --> 0:32:14.160 very expensive to build these facilities and uh and the 0:32:14.200 --> 0:32:18.800 result of of decades of research. There's filtering technique. There's 0:32:18.840 --> 0:32:22.640 actually if you want to see a more detailed approach 0:32:22.680 --> 0:32:25.920 to how this is done in a real system, there's 0:32:25.960 --> 0:32:31.120 a fun little documentary that's on YouTube. It's before Fawcett, 0:32:31.160 --> 0:32:33.400 after flush I believe his West. Yeah, yeah, you were 0:32:33.400 --> 0:32:36.080 talking about that. It's about the Chicago water system, which 0:32:36.120 --> 0:32:38.640 is phenomenal. They have like, at least at the time 0:32:38.640 --> 0:32:41.240 of the documentary, they had the world's largest water treatment 0:32:41.280 --> 0:32:44.520 facility and they get their their water from the Great 0:32:44.600 --> 0:32:48.160 Lake and uh, it's interesting. They have all these tunnels 0:32:48.160 --> 0:32:50.600 that are underneath the lake that allow lake water to 0:32:50.640 --> 0:32:54.320 go through. And it's a really cool documentary. It's like 0:32:54.360 --> 0:32:57.480 seven minutes long. So we'll link to it because, um 0:32:57.640 --> 0:32:59.640 if you want to see more of a step by 0:32:59.640 --> 0:33:02.240 step process and kind of see animations of what is 0:33:02.280 --> 0:33:05.200 going on the stuff that I just described, it has 0:33:05.240 --> 0:33:08.040 all of that. It's really good. But but yeah, you know, 0:33:08.160 --> 0:33:11.320 so not not everywhere in the world has these these 0:33:11.320 --> 0:33:15.040 wonderful treatment facilities and um and it can be a 0:33:15.400 --> 0:33:19.600 huge problem for the spread of diseases. Um Uh. Like 0:33:19.680 --> 0:33:22.160 remember how I said there's estimates of two billion people 0:33:22.200 --> 0:33:25.520 in Asia without safe drinking water. There's an estimated additional 0:33:25.640 --> 0:33:29.920 three billion there without safe sanitation and water waste management. Right, So, 0:33:29.960 --> 0:33:32.120 on top of the fact that there are billions of 0:33:32.160 --> 0:33:34.960 people who don't have access to an adequate water or 0:33:35.080 --> 0:33:40.320 waste management system, there's an environmental concern with any type 0:33:40.360 --> 0:33:43.960 of water system, right. Well, anytime that you're moving around 0:33:44.160 --> 0:33:46.840 a large natural resource like water, you're you're gonna be 0:33:46.920 --> 0:33:49.719 You're gonna be screwing with the natural system of things, right, 0:33:49.960 --> 0:33:51.760 I mean, which which is on purpose and which is 0:33:51.760 --> 0:33:55.600 good because it lets people um survive, but bad and 0:33:55.680 --> 0:33:57.840 that you can really mess with the ecology of a 0:33:57.880 --> 0:34:00.959 local area. Yeah, you need to take in to consideration 0:34:01.000 --> 0:34:04.120 everything from the water that you're taking, Like wherever the 0:34:04.160 --> 0:34:06.760 reservoir happens to be, whether it's a lake or a 0:34:06.840 --> 0:34:10.040 river or even an artificial reservoir, where is that water 0:34:10.200 --> 0:34:13.640 coming from, how is it affecting the ecosystem of the 0:34:13.680 --> 0:34:17.359 area from which you are taking, And then everything from 0:34:17.600 --> 0:34:21.480 the amount of water that people are using, because water 0:34:21.640 --> 0:34:23.640 is not you know, you may have seen things on 0:34:23.719 --> 0:34:26.960 television or you know a little reminders in school about 0:34:27.000 --> 0:34:29.839 don't waste water. A lot of that has to do 0:34:29.920 --> 0:34:34.200 with not just the fact that there's you know, there's uh, 0:34:34.239 --> 0:34:36.880 it's a renewable resource, but there's only so much of 0:34:36.880 --> 0:34:40.239 it any particular region has at any particular time. It's 0:34:40.239 --> 0:34:43.759 also an energy concern because it takes a lot of 0:34:43.880 --> 0:34:46.279 energy to gather this water from the source, and even 0:34:46.440 --> 0:34:50.000 using gravity, we're still talking about having pumping stations things 0:34:50.040 --> 0:34:52.120 like that. So the more water you use, the more 0:34:52.239 --> 0:34:56.960 energy has to be uh consumed in order to continue 0:34:57.000 --> 0:34:59.520 that that supply of water. Right here in the US, 0:34:59.560 --> 0:35:02.760 I think that the e p A reported that, um, 0:35:03.200 --> 0:35:07.440 we use three or four percent of our countrywide energy 0:35:07.719 --> 0:35:10.719 getting water where it needs to go. And and that's 0:35:10.800 --> 0:35:13.279 that's on a national level, and that's only because most 0:35:13.320 --> 0:35:15.879 of that is dealt with by municipal systems, where water 0:35:15.960 --> 0:35:19.560 treatment is usually the largest consumer of energy without any 0:35:19.560 --> 0:35:23.239 given community. Right So, I mean, clearly there are a 0:35:23.239 --> 0:35:25.920 lot of concerns for using water wisely, and then of 0:35:25.960 --> 0:35:29.560 course the whole treatment process and how that water once 0:35:29.600 --> 0:35:32.719 treated as then introduced back into the environment. All of 0:35:32.719 --> 0:35:34.920 these things have an impact. And if the if the 0:35:34.920 --> 0:35:39.400 treatment facility isn't truly sophisticated, or if it's not adequate, 0:35:39.719 --> 0:35:43.719 then you could be making a catastrophic effect on your environment, 0:35:43.760 --> 0:35:48.000 which in turn can either directly affect the population that's 0:35:48.000 --> 0:35:50.839 getting the water in the first place or other populations 0:35:50.840 --> 0:35:53.759 that are downstream or nearby. Right. Yeah, this this can 0:35:53.800 --> 0:35:57.239 also get really political. Um yeah, in fact, even within 0:35:57.280 --> 0:35:59.520 the United States, it can get political. I know that 0:35:59.520 --> 0:36:02.560 sounds of crazy, especially to people who may live outside 0:36:02.640 --> 0:36:04.760 of the US and they think of it as a nation, 0:36:05.239 --> 0:36:08.959 but we're divided up into states obviously. And uh, here's 0:36:09.000 --> 0:36:11.760 a perfect example, Lauren and I. We live in Georgia. 0:36:12.320 --> 0:36:15.160 We have two states that border US that use very 0:36:15.200 --> 0:36:18.359 similar sources of water, the same source of water at 0:36:18.400 --> 0:36:21.920 least for certain regions, Alabama and Florida. They all are 0:36:22.000 --> 0:36:24.960 using water that is coming from come downstream from US. Yeah, 0:36:24.960 --> 0:36:29.920 from the Chattahoochee actually, and Alabama and Florida often are 0:36:30.040 --> 0:36:33.439 um competing for those resources along with Georgia. So if 0:36:33.560 --> 0:36:37.120 Georgia decides to do something on a state level that's 0:36:37.160 --> 0:36:41.080 going to affect that water source, it impacts these other states, 0:36:41.160 --> 0:36:43.799 and you get this kind of tension. This is within 0:36:44.040 --> 0:36:47.879 one country where yeah, yeah, and internationally it can get 0:36:48.040 --> 0:36:50.840 pretty messy. I just just for example, most of Iraq's 0:36:50.880 --> 0:36:53.920 water supply originates and rivers in Turkey, which means that 0:36:54.040 --> 0:36:55.799 for for Iraq to get the water that it needs, 0:36:55.840 --> 0:36:58.280 conservation efforts have to begin in a whole other country 0:36:58.320 --> 0:37:00.239 that they might not be agreeing with very much at 0:37:00.239 --> 0:37:02.520 the time. Right. So if you have one country that says, 0:37:02.719 --> 0:37:05.319 you know, well, we'll conserve as much as we need 0:37:05.360 --> 0:37:08.000 to for our needs, but why should we be considered, 0:37:08.120 --> 0:37:10.759 and why should we worry about your needs you're you 0:37:10.840 --> 0:37:14.160 don't you're not part of our country. That's sticky, that's 0:37:14.719 --> 0:37:17.080 that's you know. I mean obviously it raises up very 0:37:17.080 --> 0:37:20.680 tricky ethical questions, and you know, you may not be 0:37:20.760 --> 0:37:24.400 at all uh able to affect those the answers to 0:37:24.440 --> 0:37:27.000 those questions if you aren't in that particular country. So 0:37:27.640 --> 0:37:32.799 you know, it does get pretty sticky. I will say, Yeah, 0:37:32.800 --> 0:37:35.640 there's there's a whole bunch of different problems that that 0:37:35.719 --> 0:37:39.799 really go on with uh, with with water and how 0:37:39.840 --> 0:37:44.080 we're going to kind of bring these old methods of 0:37:44.239 --> 0:37:46.960 getting it places and treating it into the future because 0:37:47.320 --> 0:37:50.319 you know, we're the population is growing. We're certainly not 0:37:50.360 --> 0:37:53.520 going to have less need for water anytime soon. Yeah, 0:37:53.640 --> 0:37:56.000 so some things that we can look into or things 0:37:56.040 --> 0:38:00.000 like using uh different approaches for agriculture, which would obviously 0:38:00.239 --> 0:38:03.000 put less of a demand on our water use. If 0:38:03.000 --> 0:38:07.040 we're using fresh water for agriculture, and we can come 0:38:07.120 --> 0:38:09.880 up with plants that either need less water, or we 0:38:09.960 --> 0:38:13.600 come up with farming techniques that don't use as much water. 0:38:13.920 --> 0:38:16.600 Because I mean, there there are other byproducts to this too, Right, 0:38:16.680 --> 0:38:20.120 If you have an enormous field that is treated with 0:38:20.239 --> 0:38:23.440 various types of herbicides, pesticides, that kind of thing, and 0:38:23.440 --> 0:38:27.160 you're using massive amounts of water to distribute those you 0:38:27.200 --> 0:38:29.879 get run off of all those chemicals that can then 0:38:29.960 --> 0:38:32.160 enter the local water table and that can be a 0:38:32.160 --> 0:38:34.520 big problem. So, I mean you can see that this 0:38:34.600 --> 0:38:39.640 is not a simple system. It's very complex. Absolutely. And 0:38:39.640 --> 0:38:43.759 and also according to the e P, a um of 0:38:43.880 --> 0:38:47.319 water treated by water systems is lost to leaks um 0:38:47.520 --> 0:38:49.200 in some systems that can be as much as six 0:38:49.719 --> 0:38:53.480 The worldwide average is about twenty and and that's you know, 0:38:53.520 --> 0:38:56.239 that's a huge amount. All right, So let's talk a 0:38:56.280 --> 0:38:58.600 little bit. And you know, we've talked about the challenges 0:38:58.640 --> 0:39:00.440 in the state of the art as it is today, 0:39:00.480 --> 0:39:02.840 but there are people who are working on some pretty 0:39:02.840 --> 0:39:08.879 cool stuff that could in theory really revolutionized water systems. Right. Oh, absolutely, Um, 0:39:08.960 --> 0:39:10.839 some of some of the more some of the more 0:39:10.880 --> 0:39:13.920 down to earth. I'll cover those first methods. Some some 0:39:13.960 --> 0:39:18.160 researchers are talking about the simple act of diverting watershed 0:39:18.560 --> 0:39:21.919 of the physical area of land from which you would 0:39:21.960 --> 0:39:25.560 get your water. Right because because classically your your watershed 0:39:25.840 --> 0:39:29.400 is far away from a city, basically, um, nothing to 0:39:29.440 --> 0:39:31.839 do with your cities. But in in these are modern times, 0:39:31.840 --> 0:39:33.920 we've got so many more people living in urban areas 0:39:34.280 --> 0:39:38.600 and um, so much wasted water coming down in rainfall 0:39:38.680 --> 0:39:41.440 on these large urban areas that if we if we 0:39:41.480 --> 0:39:46.120 look at at just increasing the system capacity of cities 0:39:46.160 --> 0:39:49.960 to deal with that water by by replacing concrete with 0:39:50.000 --> 0:39:53.160 porous pavement, by adding more plant life to cities, by 0:39:53.200 --> 0:39:57.000 restoring wetlands, or or installing rain barrels and other building 0:39:57.080 --> 0:40:00.279 gray water management systems, right, Yeah, gray water is one 0:40:00.320 --> 0:40:04.600 of those things that can be incredibly useful for particular applications. 0:40:04.600 --> 0:40:06.960 I mean, obviously it's not something that you would necessarily say, 0:40:07.040 --> 0:40:10.360 let's hook this up to yeah, and then I'll drink 0:40:10.400 --> 0:40:13.760 and then I'll drink, or a bubbler if you prefer. Yeah, 0:40:13.800 --> 0:40:18.200 gray water being um, the the basically clean wastewater that 0:40:18.320 --> 0:40:22.200 comes from mild householder or commercial applications. Right, And there's 0:40:22.200 --> 0:40:24.719 plenty of different uses we could put that to rather 0:40:24.760 --> 0:40:28.319 than using I mean, it really does water alan Absolutely, 0:40:28.440 --> 0:40:32.560 it's really crazy to think that we have incredibly fresh 0:40:32.600 --> 0:40:35.600 water in our toilets. Yeah, that's that's one of those 0:40:35.640 --> 0:40:39.120 things that drives me completely. Just when you think that 0:40:39.160 --> 0:40:41.799 there are two billion people in Asia who do not 0:40:41.920 --> 0:40:44.359 have access to clean water, and we're using drinking water 0:40:44.400 --> 0:40:46.840 in our toilets. Yeah, so see, using gray water in 0:40:46.880 --> 0:40:49.560 a system like that could end up meaning that that 0:40:49.640 --> 0:40:54.080 water could be used in other applications. Obviously, the big 0:40:54.080 --> 0:40:56.319 problem with the two billion people in Asia is that 0:40:56.520 --> 0:40:59.440 they don't have the systems in place or the resources 0:40:59.520 --> 0:41:02.600 available to them. It's not just that the Earth has 0:41:02.719 --> 0:41:05.920 an x amount of fresh water that's evenly distributed across 0:41:05.960 --> 0:41:08.279 the entire planet, like we're saying, yeah, and you know, 0:41:08.320 --> 0:41:09.840 it's it's not the kind of thing where you know, 0:41:09.840 --> 0:41:12.040 if if you if you avoid flushing your toilet, that's 0:41:12.040 --> 0:41:14.520 not going to give water to the poor kids in China, 0:41:14.640 --> 0:41:16.719 like like it's yeah, it's like we said, it's a 0:41:16.760 --> 0:41:19.879 little more complicated than that. Okay, so that makes sense. Yeah, 0:41:19.920 --> 0:41:22.080 And in some communities are already doing a whole lot 0:41:22.120 --> 0:41:25.200 for that. We mentioned in in that in that listener 0:41:25.280 --> 0:41:28.080 mail from Valerie, she she had mentioned Las Vegas systems 0:41:28.120 --> 0:41:30.680 and they are using a lot of water reclamation in 0:41:30.800 --> 0:41:33.880 order to to to stretch the water as far as 0:41:33.880 --> 0:41:36.239 it will go because they're kind of in a desert. Yeah, 0:41:36.280 --> 0:41:38.759 not one of those areas where they've got, you know, 0:41:39.040 --> 0:41:43.840 huge reservoirs that are naturally occurring nearby. It's a little 0:41:43.840 --> 0:41:46.120 tricky and I don't know if you know this, but 0:41:46.239 --> 0:41:48.719 Las Vegas is kind of a big city. It's got 0:41:48.719 --> 0:41:50.800 a few people, a few people in it. I'll be 0:41:50.960 --> 0:41:54.719 there soon enough for ce. Yes, that's right, that's coming up. 0:41:54.760 --> 0:41:59.280 It's kind of exciting. Also, currently happening lots of new 0:41:59.360 --> 0:42:04.120 technology in recycling, purification, and desalination. Yeah, we we've seen 0:42:04.760 --> 0:42:09.120 things like the water reclamation technology that NASA has pioneered 0:42:09.120 --> 0:42:11.600 has been amazing. Like if you look at the stuff 0:42:11.640 --> 0:42:14.120 they have on the International Space Station. And it's not 0:42:14.200 --> 0:42:19.120 just NASA, obviously, there are other space organizations, European space organizations, uh, 0:42:19.640 --> 0:42:22.759 Russian space organizations that have all contributed to this kind 0:42:22.800 --> 0:42:26.759 of body of science and technology. But they really make 0:42:26.800 --> 0:42:29.920 water go as far as it possibly can with the 0:42:29.960 --> 0:42:33.920 cost of what dollars for a pound of stuff to 0:42:33.960 --> 0:42:37.239 send into space, right, you know, every every ounce counts. Yeah, 0:42:37.239 --> 0:42:40.200 you don't wanna, you don't want to be constantly they're 0:42:40.239 --> 0:42:43.280 thirsty again, gotta lug up another hundred pounds of water 0:42:44.480 --> 0:42:47.239 go to the bank. No, it's it's you know, they 0:42:47.320 --> 0:42:51.160 have systems that recapture water from everything from the water 0:42:51.280 --> 0:42:55.640 vapor and their breath, the sweat, urine, things like that. 0:42:55.840 --> 0:42:58.279 You know, not all this water necessarily goes right back 0:42:58.280 --> 0:43:01.520 into drinking water either, but it's necessary for the system. 0:43:01.600 --> 0:43:04.239 So we can learn from that and use those same 0:43:04.280 --> 0:43:07.680 sort of technologies and various applications here on Earth, not 0:43:07.719 --> 0:43:10.239 all of them. Obviously. We're not gonna have giant water 0:43:10.320 --> 0:43:15.600 vapor uh condensers out there capturing everyone's breath, but probably 0:43:15.680 --> 0:43:19.840 probably not in most buildings. Um but I would I 0:43:19.880 --> 0:43:22.440 don't know, we might get one in here someday, but 0:43:22.480 --> 0:43:24.680 if we could, that would be that would be terrible 0:43:24.680 --> 0:43:27.880 and lovely. I feel like Robert would love a love 0:43:27.920 --> 0:43:30.160 an art project about that. Um but but yeah, there's 0:43:30.160 --> 0:43:34.320 there's lots of really interesting materials and membrane sciences, different 0:43:34.360 --> 0:43:37.680 electrical properties of different things. We talked about that a 0:43:37.719 --> 0:43:41.160 bunch in our forward thinking episode of desalination, which is 0:43:41.160 --> 0:43:44.600 of course, and I mean that is a nice solution 0:43:44.680 --> 0:43:47.800 to getting drinking water when you don't have any fresh 0:43:47.800 --> 0:43:50.719 water in your Yeah, and there we've also seen some 0:43:50.760 --> 0:43:54.760 cool filtration systems that can be used to purify water. 0:43:55.680 --> 0:43:58.160 If you have access to water but it's not pure, 0:43:58.719 --> 0:44:01.480 you can run it through these things. Dean Cayman worked 0:44:01.480 --> 0:44:05.160 on one. I know that Bill Gates is really behind 0:44:05.440 --> 0:44:09.759 technologies that are being developed for developing nations that may 0:44:09.800 --> 0:44:14.640 have problems getting clean water, and you just you pour 0:44:14.760 --> 0:44:18.320 this stuff in on one end and again gravity pulls 0:44:18.360 --> 0:44:21.120 the water through the various systems until at the end 0:44:21.160 --> 0:44:23.120 of it you get potable drinking water, which is pretty 0:44:23.160 --> 0:44:26.279 phenomenal stuff. Now, these are are small, They're meant for 0:44:26.360 --> 0:44:28.960 small communities. They're not you know, something that's going to 0:44:29.000 --> 0:44:32.240 support an enormous city, and you might need multiple units 0:44:32.280 --> 0:44:35.040 depending upon how large the population of that area is. 0:44:35.400 --> 0:44:38.719 But it's really promising. But but Lauren, I want to 0:44:38.760 --> 0:44:41.920 know about a crazy kind of science fiction e E E 0:44:42.040 --> 0:44:46.640 approach to totally renovating the water system. Get anything for me? 0:44:47.000 --> 0:44:50.799 I do. In fact, um, have have you heard of 0:44:50.920 --> 0:44:54.440 four D printing? Oh? My gosh, four deep printing. I 0:44:54.480 --> 0:44:58.839 remember seeing a devastatingly handsome bald Man talk about that 0:44:58.920 --> 0:45:03.160 on a video not to long ago. He's kind of narcissistic, though, 0:45:03.160 --> 0:45:05.399 I don't know. It's okay, it's okay. When you look 0:45:05.440 --> 0:45:09.480 that good, it's completely justified. There there was an episode, 0:45:09.480 --> 0:45:12.440 there's another separate episode of forward Thinking that was all 0:45:12.480 --> 0:45:14.640 about forty printing and and this is kind of a 0:45:14.719 --> 0:45:20.000 kitchy catchphrase, um, but it's we're talking about self assembly really. 0:45:20.120 --> 0:45:22.120 Um So, So okay, M I T has a self 0:45:22.120 --> 0:45:25.399 assembly lab that's being run by one Skylar Tippets. Great name, 0:45:26.320 --> 0:45:28.920 it is a great name. Um he's he's an architect 0:45:29.160 --> 0:45:31.919 and and comps I and artist kind of dude. And 0:45:32.120 --> 0:45:34.440 um in in M I t S word, self assembly 0:45:34.520 --> 0:45:37.520 is a process by which disordered parts build an ordered 0:45:37.520 --> 0:45:41.200 structure through local interaction. And so what they're really interested 0:45:41.200 --> 0:45:44.560 in here is is using material science and biological science 0:45:44.920 --> 0:45:51.080 to create mostly analog devices that can react to changing situations. Right, So, 0:45:51.160 --> 0:45:53.920 and and usually it means that you're adding some form 0:45:54.000 --> 0:45:57.520 of energy or introducing some new element to this material, 0:45:57.719 --> 0:46:02.239 which will then undergo a change in shape or form. Right. 0:46:02.280 --> 0:46:04.600 This is a really proof of concept kind of stage. 0:46:04.640 --> 0:46:06.960 Right now, they're there at this at this very basic 0:46:07.000 --> 0:46:09.239 like they've built a long tube that, when dropped in 0:46:09.280 --> 0:46:12.040 water well morph to form the letters M I T. Yeah, 0:46:12.040 --> 0:46:15.040 And they had they had one flat piece of it 0:46:15.080 --> 0:46:17.879 looks like just plastic, but when you put water on it, 0:46:17.880 --> 0:46:21.520 it would form itself into a cube. Um. Yes, you 0:46:21.560 --> 0:46:24.200 know you could watch the video and then you see 0:46:24.200 --> 0:46:26.799 that it's sped up by about eight times, and you 0:46:26.800 --> 0:46:31.120 realize this is a gradual process. It's really slow. I 0:46:31.120 --> 0:46:34.200 mean all of this is thanks to a multi material 0:46:34.280 --> 0:46:37.640 form of three D printing. Um. And the four D 0:46:37.960 --> 0:46:40.480 in in the fourth dimension and in the four D 0:46:40.600 --> 0:46:44.600 title is time. Um. But but but so so multi 0:46:44.640 --> 0:46:47.840 material three D printing. Since different materials can have different 0:46:47.880 --> 0:46:50.960 water absorption properties, Um, you know you can. You can 0:46:51.360 --> 0:46:54.239 build them so that they will squish up in different ways. Right, 0:46:54.280 --> 0:46:57.080 You've got you've got an interesting approach where you've got 0:46:57.080 --> 0:47:00.320 this material that can actually react to changing such a waans. 0:47:00.360 --> 0:47:03.239 So if you engineer it so that it behaves a 0:47:03.280 --> 0:47:06.880 particular way under a particular se circumstances, there are a 0:47:06.880 --> 0:47:09.920 lot of applications that you could put this to, including 0:47:10.560 --> 0:47:13.799 completely revolutionizing a water system. Yeah. I mean, you know, 0:47:14.320 --> 0:47:16.840 anything is huge as as a water system is a 0:47:16.960 --> 0:47:19.439 really long way off from from a cute little tube 0:47:19.440 --> 0:47:21.600 that spells out a cute little thing over of course 0:47:21.600 --> 0:47:24.680 of several minutes. Um. But but you know, imagine a 0:47:24.760 --> 0:47:28.080 pipe that changes shape to accommodate spikes in in in 0:47:28.160 --> 0:47:31.400 watershed or water waste or frozen water. Right. Soe now 0:47:31.480 --> 0:47:34.200 this would be amazing because, like we had said over 0:47:34.200 --> 0:47:37.440 and over again, the water systems we have have formed 0:47:37.560 --> 0:47:41.520 over several decades, and they're not uniform at all, and 0:47:41.840 --> 0:47:43.640 they you know, some of the pipes are different sizes 0:47:43.800 --> 0:47:45.640 than other pipes, and you know, you might have it 0:47:45.680 --> 0:47:49.600 where certain parts of a city may have trouble meeting 0:47:49.680 --> 0:47:52.759 the water needs of that particular part of the city 0:47:52.800 --> 0:47:56.200 compared to others just because the infrastructure doesn't really support 0:47:56.239 --> 0:47:59.040 it anymore. If you had pipes that could adjust to 0:47:59.160 --> 0:48:02.200 the right to the to the level of demand, then 0:48:02.239 --> 0:48:05.359 if the population fluctuated, if it went, you know, got 0:48:05.400 --> 0:48:09.680 bigger or smaller, the pipes themselves, in theory, could end 0:48:09.760 --> 0:48:12.719 up adjusting themselves to meet whatever the new demand was 0:48:13.000 --> 0:48:17.279 to create the optimum water pressure for the amount of 0:48:17.360 --> 0:48:19.839 people that it needed to serve um Or what about 0:48:19.880 --> 0:48:22.800 a pipe that could shift itself to self repair damage. 0:48:23.040 --> 0:48:26.520 And even more freaky than that, which is already amazing, 0:48:26.560 --> 0:48:28.319 the idea of you don't have to worry so much 0:48:28.320 --> 0:48:31.759 about maintenance because the pipes maintain themselves. They won't really 0:48:31.760 --> 0:48:35.160 break because they can just move bits around. It's another 0:48:35.200 --> 0:48:37.319 thing that I think is amazing is this idea of 0:48:37.320 --> 0:48:41.320 an undulating pipe. Now this is way off into science 0:48:41.320 --> 0:48:44.040 fiction future, right, absolutely, but but the the idea of 0:48:44.080 --> 0:48:46.960 this is that the pipe can undulate to push water 0:48:47.120 --> 0:48:50.400 through itself. So in other words, you don't need pumping stations. 0:48:50.440 --> 0:48:52.920 You don't even need to worry about gravity anymore. You've 0:48:52.960 --> 0:48:55.960 got pipes that can change their shape and propel the 0:48:56.000 --> 0:48:58.640 water through them, providing the water pressure you need. And 0:48:58.680 --> 0:49:01.680 it's all built into of the material itself. You don't 0:49:01.800 --> 0:49:05.520 have any electronic parts, you don't have any generators. Yeah, 0:49:05.760 --> 0:49:09.160 it's just doing it on its own because of the 0:49:09.160 --> 0:49:12.360 way that it was constructed. And that's really what I 0:49:12.440 --> 0:49:15.719 find phenomenal. It's not like there's some tiny electronic component 0:49:15.840 --> 0:49:21.480 inside this stuff. No, it's literally the way it was built. Yeah, 0:49:21.640 --> 0:49:24.919 and just because it was built this way, it will 0:49:24.960 --> 0:49:28.960 react you know, in X way when why happens because 0:49:29.000 --> 0:49:31.799 in some cases it's things like kinetic energy, right, Like 0:49:31.840 --> 0:49:34.000 if you know, you might have a sheet of this 0:49:34.080 --> 0:49:36.040 stuff and if you throw it on the ground, it 0:49:36.080 --> 0:49:39.360 turns into a chair over the course of like minutes. 0:49:39.400 --> 0:49:42.319 But anyway, I think the connect ones are a little 0:49:42.320 --> 0:49:45.279 bit quicker. Yeah they can be. Yeah, but that would 0:49:45.280 --> 0:49:46.919 be you know, that's the kind of stuff we're talking 0:49:46.960 --> 0:49:50.320 about now. Granted again this is sci fi science stuff. 0:49:51.280 --> 0:49:53.640 Does have a really great Ted talk that will link to. 0:49:53.719 --> 0:49:56.720 But but you'll see in this Ted talk he presents 0:49:56.760 --> 0:49:59.000 a couple examples of what they're doing right at this 0:49:59.120 --> 0:50:01.440 very moment, and it is much less impressive than we've 0:50:01.480 --> 0:50:06.480 just made it sound, um, but the potential assuming that 0:50:06.520 --> 0:50:08.480 we can get it to work. So I'm really looking 0:50:08.520 --> 0:50:11.480 forward to seeing what what what people wind up doing 0:50:11.480 --> 0:50:14.640 with that. Yeah, I'm sure we're only you know, thirty 0:50:14.719 --> 0:50:18.080 to fifty years away, right right around the same time 0:50:18.080 --> 0:50:19.839 that we hit the singularity and right around the time 0:50:19.960 --> 0:50:23.120 you know, singularity robot uprising and undulating pipes. They're all 0:50:23.120 --> 0:50:26.160 going to come on a Tuesday, So we'll be recording 0:50:26.160 --> 0:50:28.560 forward thinking, assuming we're all still around at that point. 0:50:28.600 --> 0:50:31.440 I mean, I got no plans. So anyway, this was 0:50:31.480 --> 0:50:33.480 one of those topics I thought was really interesting. You know, 0:50:33.520 --> 0:50:35.919 it had a historical element to it that was fun 0:50:35.960 --> 0:50:39.320 to talk about. It has a real impact on us today, 0:50:39.440 --> 0:50:42.920 right now, and the promise of technology in the future 0:50:43.200 --> 0:50:46.160 has at least the potential to make it a phenomenally 0:50:46.360 --> 0:50:49.759 interesting uh system that we could see, you know, in 0:50:49.800 --> 0:50:53.919 a few decades. Assuming that that this is everything's working out. 0:50:53.920 --> 0:50:56.359 Obviously it's a lot of work that we're talking about here, 0:50:56.400 --> 0:51:00.759 but sure even just just just big data and monitoring techniques. Um, 0:51:01.000 --> 0:51:04.399 getting everyone to work kind of together on this problem. UM, 0:51:04.560 --> 0:51:08.200 I think is going to be huge satellite data to 0:51:08.000 --> 0:51:11.400 to watch stuff. I mean, satellites can can detect changes 0:51:11.400 --> 0:51:15.359 in gravity that therefore detect changes in groundwater concentration. That's 0:51:15.360 --> 0:51:19.880 pretty incredible. Um. I didn't detect any changes in gravity, 0:51:19.920 --> 0:51:21.840 but I only saw the film once, so I have 0:51:21.880 --> 0:51:23.360 to see it at least one more time before I 0:51:23.360 --> 0:51:25.600 could tell you what it changed. So, if you guys 0:51:25.600 --> 0:51:27.840 have anything to to say to us about this or 0:51:27.880 --> 0:51:30.200 other topics, why don't you write to us our email 0:51:30.200 --> 0:51:33.239 addresses tech stuff at Discovery dot com or drop us 0:51:33.239 --> 0:51:36.080 a line on Facebook, Twitter or Tumbler. You can find 0:51:36.160 --> 0:51:38.680 us with the handle of text Stuff H. S. W 0:51:38.960 --> 0:51:41.160 and Lauren and I will talk to you again really 0:51:41.239 --> 0:51:48.000 soon for more on this and thousands of other topics. 0:51:48.120 --> 0:51:55.200 Does it has to work dot com