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Don't Eat The White Snow Either
loteck writes "An interesting article about an Australian ski resort that is converting human waste into freshly driven snow. The waste is converted "through a three-step purifying process of UV light filtration, ozonation and ultra-filtration", and they say it's "even cleaner than that made from nearby creek water." I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste."
I'll think you'll find that's due to the fact there IS NO WATER in the nearby creek. You can thank the Snowy Mountains Hydro project for that one.
EGG, the Electronic Gamers Guild
Why not use the recycled water to fill up the toliets again instead of putting it on the mountainside. Not sure if I'd want to be skiing on a wastewater snow slope.
they got some REAL shitty skiing at that resort.
I think this completely validates the time I yell "oh shit!" when I fell skiing.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
SHITBALL FIGHT!!!!!!! heh heh......doesn't have the same ring.....
As we would say in Australia right now, given the fires in the Snowy Mountains region...
"This is about as useless as pissing on a bushfire."
I wonder what the writer of the write-up think happen with all other human waste?
You and I both live in the middle of mother natures great recycler.
There is no such thing as to remove human waste, you may MOVE it at best.
-- From Denmark
I think this resort would make for one of the mankiest on ratemypoo.com
Uh oh, did anyone check to see if MS has a patent on the stuff?
Now I can legitimately roll in my own filth!
:p
All the way down the mountain!
Oh dear...
That's just taking the piss. However, seriously - The 7 million people who live in london don't seem to mind drinking 'recycled' water. Why should it be different here?
Now to find the decent snow you REALLY have to go off-piste.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
I've heard of another project that uses semi-processed waste water to make snow. The process of making snow, in which the water is mixed with some other stuff ("chemicals", they are called, I think ?), then sprayed under very high pressure. As the water emerges from the spray nozzel, the sudden depressurization causes the cells of any living organizims (say , germs, or bacteria) to burst, effectively disinfecting the water on a microscopic level.
And they swore you couldn't tell it was sewage...
-------------------------
A person of moderate zeal
Where do you think waste water goes? Back into the drinking water! Sure they run it though a filtering process when they make it drinking water again but the process probably isn't a lot different except these guys probably don't add as many nasty chemicals. If it were me I wouldn't even bother telling my customers. I'd run a monthly (weekly?) test to make sure my filters were doing their job and just go on about my business.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
ski areas have been usiing variations on this for years - a while back (mid, late 90s) there was a fuss about using mildly engineered enterococcal bacteria in the water to not only provide nuclei for the 'snowflakes' to form (that's why wastewater's so useful, full of dead bacteria and bits of protein and crap), but also to secrete some enzyme that would increase the temperature they could blow snow to 35 or 38F or something. this is probably safer than most snowblowing systems; they just use water atraight from the nearest pond/lake.river/stream/whatever - friend of mine got giardia from eating made snow once...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
My other thought is, I'd imaging there must be some sort of minimum standard for the cleanliness of the water to make snow (no, there probably isn't a national standard like there is for drinking water), but there's probably some maximum amount of crud allowed in the water to not clog up the snowmaker machines. I've never been skiing, but don't you generally have several layers of clothing on, and nearly every part of your body covered? I don't think too many people are getting sick from the quality of the water used in snowmaking. Plus, are you eating it? Maybe the guy in the footage from ABC's Wide World of Sports (" .. and the agony of defeat... ") ate some snow, but most skiers probably don't ingest the snow.
I'm glad to see that they're purifying their sewage that much, but wouldn't it have been treated properly before this system was put in palce, and then discharged into a creek for other users (human, plant, and animal alike) downstream to use?
just thoughts from a non-skier, non sewage plant operater..
What happens when the filtration unit breaks down and starts spraying raw sewage onto the unhappy punters?
If I seem short sighted, it is because I stand on the shoulders of midgets
I can't wait for this technology to become sufficiently miniaturized that you can have it fitted internally, and just excrete pure white snow directly. It would certainly make snowball fights more interesting.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
The resort has an amazing 7500 beds, which all adds up to a lot of visitors making a lot of human waste. Converting this into snow seemed a logical step.
Maybe I'm not as logical as I once thought.
Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains.
Mark my words, as a result of this development the Australian downhill team will be unbeatable at the next Winter Olympics. I mean, the motivation to avoid an "agony of defeat" moment with a fece-bank and to get off the hill as soon as possible would be incredible.
Of course the gas masks will make their skiers less aerodynamic, so it might even things out.
Try again later!
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Nothing new about that at all, been going on for centuries, unless you were the settlement furthest upstream. Even then, you were probably drinking run-off sheep and goat...
They already have "snow" and "powder", now they get the "good clean shit" too....
:)
No wonder australians are so relaxed
Now all I need is a way to convert piss into water, just like Kevin Costner did on his boat :)
The only sensible season to spend *any* time in the Australian high country is summer, when the weather is damn pleasant, the flowers are out, and the views are fscking spectacular. Particularly at the moment, when half of it is on fire ... :/
We are, however, much better skiiers than the Austrians are surfers :)
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Can they still make snow during a brown-out?
Australian ski resort
.
Emphasis on Australian
Does anyone else also think this is a contradiction in terms??
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
do you call that a piss-te?
IAAL
"even cleaner than that made from nearby creek water." I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste.
A typical knee-jerk reaction that nearly all of us have, myself included. But perhaps quite an unfair one.
This is going to seem a little off-topic. Bear with me!
We seem to be quite often short of water these days, and since we don't have a lot of new water catchment possibilities, it would seem that it can only get worse as the population increases.
Saving water seems to be the key here. Not only through more efficient appliances, but also through multiple uses of our water. How much sense does it make to be flushing our toilets with drinking water?
Some houses already capture "grey water" and use it for tasks where drinking water is not required. Obviously there's some filtering required. I've heard of other projects which are completely water self-sufficient. Yes, you end up boiling your potatoes in recycled piss!
Pretty revulsive to us today, but who knows? Maybe our grandkids will find it completely normal.
Nothing like snowboarding from your own pile of shit...
Check my site: http://pixel.pagina.nl
Before you know it we will be told not to eat the mints many resturaunts have in the bathroom :(
The Swiss have a word for this: Schussenfallenschitzensnarfen. I think there's an umlaut in there somewhere.
I like where the resort manager assures us that the Australian people are "mature" enough to see what a great idea this is.
I'm not sure it would be the "mature" individual who would be enthused about skiing on their own excrement.
And if the Australian people are "mature" enough, what people isn't? The Chinese? The Jamaicans? Perhaps he feels he'll only alienate the 'childish,' 'spoiled' populace of Switzerland with his revolutionary shit-shooters.
John
Machines take me by surprise with great frequency. -A. Turing
I'm sure they are lying idiots.
when you consider that the creek is basically going to be filled with solid and liquid animal waste and decomposed fish and other animals.
It's enough to give you OCD, isn't it?
I wonder if they didn't try to experiment with untreated waste first. I would think it might have a lower coefficient of friction. Pretty slick slopes. Just give the customers bodysuits and gas masks, and they'll be happier than a pig in... oh.
Why exactly do they purify it? Shit skiing is really catching on.
That's how the water recycling systems on the space station work. Believe it or not, the water is actually more clean and pure than most tap and bottled water. Such systems are also planned for use on flights to Mars.
Citizens figured the water's been through so many kidneys, it *has* to be pure....
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
..that slope I skied on last week was yellow.
Outdoor digital photography, mostly in New Engl
Real human waste is made from... PEOPLE... Ok enough Soylent Green references. Seriously the real human waste is in the cubicle next to you playing Solitaire(actually due to the economy that guy was fired, sorry for the misinformation) and running the country, at least that's my opinion. When it is made out of real humans tell me about otherwise I will make comedy about skiing on shitty snow.
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
Hey kids! Anyone want a snow cone?
Mount Buller: Where the affluent meet the effluent.
" I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste."
I think this says more about Australians...
/me ducks...
Ceci n'est pas une sig.
I think this deserves a nomination for Best Slashdot Article Title.
It's a widely known "fact" in London (not sure if it's an urban myth or not - I suspect not) that water goes through the system seven times. So, there's a good chance your tap water is someone elses piss. Their extensive filtration means the water is actually pretty good.
Anyway, waste liquid has to go somewhere - a ski slope seems pretty mild compared to many alternatives.
Read reviews of shopping cart software
Myself, along with all the other organisms on this earth, piss and shit all over. It evaporates (the liquid parts, at least) and then it condenses in clouds, precipitates back down....
This wouldn't be Shit Creek, would it?
I personally would not be the least bit squeamish about this. First off, they make filters capable of filter guiarda(sp) and other microbes out. Even if they don't filter it out you can get rid of it by irradiating the water, or heck BOILING the water will kill most creepy crawlys. They can also filter other things that ain't so nice out of the water. If they make a filter that can filter chlorine out of the water at your house, then this filter or a similar one could work in this machine. They also recycle water on the shuttle because the weight of water costs so much for them to carry it up. They'd rather use as much weight for carrying satellites and other things that can help generate revenue then water for the astronauts.
Second, and I know some may dispute this, if we are running out of water where does it go? Water that evaporates down here usually turns up as a cloud and then rain somewhere on the planet. I know the planet isn't a closed system, but this water has to go somewhere. It doesn't just zoom off into space. I think that those who claim know have no idea what they are talking about when there's a water shortage. There's oceans full of it just wating to be desalinized. If they can find a economical process for desalinization, then most water problems could be solved.
Gorkman
Is it just me, or do the photos in the article seem like the 'journalists' did some 'reclaiming' of their own?
Snowflake
->
Bathroom
->
Wintery Creek
Cycle of nature I guess. Or maybe cycle of clip art? And no Australian mountain creeks look like that - there's a distinct lack of mountains!
they made me do it
Who researches this crap?!?!?!?!?!? (clever pun, I know. :) )
The idea is old and has been rehashed how many times in literature? And american's still get all stupid about it. There was an episode of Farscape recently where two of the characters had to drink each other's piss unfiltered.
First of all, the filtration process they just described in the most effective, most "high tech" filtration process used to process water. See, it works this way - OZONE is the MOST poisonous substance known to man. It's also one of the easiest to deal with. When that 03 hits the fecal coliform bacteria in the sewage (which has already had all solid matter removed from it in settling basins) they basically get oxidized to nothingness.
Most cities do less treating worse water which you drink, every day. Drink soda? You're drinking city water mixed with syrup and bottled. Drink Sparklets/bottled water? They have even more lax rules when it comes to water quality. Most cities use a sand filter/chlorination deal to treat your water. While this does a good job on fecal bacteria, it won't even irritate cryptosporidia, which can cause all sorts of nice diseases.
So don't just start saying "EW EW! Nasty!" Next to using electrolysis (which is a really sub-optimal solution on the cost angle) this is the cleanest water you'd be able to find.
Why not use their wastewater treatment system to purify the creek water instead? Then they won't have any PR problems.
Unless they have plans to commercialize the purified wastewater.
I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste.
This is what I'd typically expect from the spoiled youth of today, who think that what the water they drink is either synthetically created from pure Hydrogen and Oxygen, or at least have never been anywhere near anything even resembling filth. So when they hear that people are purifying waste and putting it on the hill side (which probably isn't too sterile as it is), or... say... Watch Dune, where people use a suit to purify their own bodilly waste products for drinking, they go "eeeeew! Gross!". Well, FYI, your water has been on this planet for millions of years! Just about every species that have lived on this planet has crapped in your water, and then it's been through natural followed by artificial purification... What the ski resort is doing is just the same, and they only put it onto the hills... Wake up and smell the water!
------- I fumbled my registration and I now must suffer
They've got some really shitty snow on that slope.
--
"we live in a post-ideological world..." - Billy Bragg.
I'm just taking a shot in the dark here, but I heard awhile back that some ski resorts were using bacteria to create snow. Essentially you mix near-freezing water with bacteria particles and fire it out. When the water freezes, it clings to the bacteria and forms snowflakes. These snowflakes are more natural than those created using other man-made methods, so the end result is more natural snow to ski/snowboard on. I'd be willing to bet that the method in the article is similar, though they don't really go into the specifics of flake formation.
This idea was proposed in Vermont years ago, and my subject line made the headlines in our papers. The idea faded, or at least the publicity about it did, and we went back to worrying about overstressing local creeks.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Back in the early 90's my dad was on some summer program where professors would go and do work for NASA and then during the year be the regular profs that they were.
He was an analytical chemistry professor and then for NASA worked on the water filtration system for the Space Station.
The basic concept being that water is heavy at 8lbs/gal and so if they can limit how much they take up, they can use that saved weight towards carrying something else.
So they wanted to bring up a small fixed amount and then recycle out the waste - so when you took a leak, it would recover that and clean it out (with very similar methods to this article interestingly enough), and then... according to my dad - was usually cleaner than the water they brought on.
I was always puzzled at why they didn't just bring on cleaner water - but I suppose he was also hinting at the astronauts bringing some inside themselves as well... don't know.
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
Cells tend to rupture when frozen, either because the ice inside expands and bursts them (fast freezing) or because long, sharp, pointy ice crystals inside form and pierce the cell membrane (slow freezing). The temperatures typically found on ski slopes (within a few degrees of zero Celsius) are ideal for the formation of large ice crystals. There are also dehydration processes at work. Finally, cells left outside in slightly warmer weather still don't do well, because they'll starve to death. (Researchers who want to preserve cells long-term store them at liquid nitrogen temperatures to stop all metabolism.)
Recent research has suggested that freezing and thawing will also disable many viruses--apparently it damages the surface proteins they use to bind to our cells. Experiments conducted on freezing whole blood for storage revealed that freezing also inactivated much of the HIV in test samples. Some jurisdictions are now considering freezing all donated blood as an additional safety precaution before transfusion.
Not so say that freezing is a panacea--there are a number of nasties that will survive the process (encysted bad guys are often reisistant) but the frozen stuff is significantly cleaner than what came in, and it may well be cleaner than what's in most rivers.
Yes, I read the article, and yes, I realize that they filter and treat the water extensively before turning it to snow...but all that work might be overkill.
~Idarubicin
Well, now it seems they have piss poor skiing all season long.
"Make me some if you're making some"
Heyall, Killington Mountain in Vermont has been doing this for over a decade if memory serves.
Even "natural" snow is filthy...
It would be interesting to do a broad chem comparison of melted natural snow versus "waste-product" snow ("This mountain is PURE SNOW!!! Do you know the street value of this slope?!")
Now where'd I put those "lemon" snow cones... 8^)
-Levendis47
--==[ AOL YIM ICQ : Levendis47 : levendis47@yahoo.com ]==--
Slashdot has been converting crap into articles and postings for some time now. In fact, this post is recycled crap that I've posted before.
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
Sugarloaf Resort in Maine has been doing this for several years with their effluent. However, they don't put that snow on the slopes.
Skiers and Riders -- http://www.snowjournal.com
Now, when someone tells you the snow on the mountain is "Shitty" you won't know if it's a positive or negative remark...
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
The final ultra-filtration step removes all suspended solids from the liquid including all biological matter, alive or dead.
What do they do with the "suspended solids"?
-ted
"Welcome to Bandini Montain!"
"Bandini is the word for... fertilizer."
Kevin Fox
-"Watchout where the humans go, dont you eat that yellow snow"
i think you'll find this is the stuff one normally intakes through the nose accompanied by brief spasmodic head jerking and a realisation that caffeine doesnt quite cut it. warning: excessive use may result in nose falling off in shower
this sig steers like a cow. and i can prove it
I'm surprised that this is being posted as news, given that theres a big notice saying the site hasn't been updated since April 12, 2002, which is just shy of 10 months ago.... so it would seem to be that this is not new news.
Now, I used to be a fan of Beyond 2000 back in the '80s and early '90s when Discovery aired the TV show in the US here, but why on earth is it still around? It's 2003 folks! Same goes for 20th Century Fox? We really need to get our heads out of our respective 20th century butts.
-Julius X
remove "-whatkindofspamdoyoutakemefor-" from email to send
Our local ski hill has gotten approval for using reclaimed water for making snow (the city's been using reclaimed water for watering lawns and such for a long time). The whole question has caused a very big fuss because the mountain is considered a holy site by local Native Americans. The arguments have been less about the health concerns and more about the desecration of a holy site. Because this is Arizona and water is at a serious premium, plus we haven't had a whole lotta snow the last few years, most folks are for using reclaimed water for snowmaking. A lot of people would rather ski on reclaimed water snow than not be able to ski at all. See the Tea Party website for one set of viepoints on the issue.
Recycled urine is, chemically, water! When I look at it from that perspective, I don't care whether it comes from a mountain spring or the dog down the street; as long as it's purified (i.e. just H2O, and preferably no Fluoride) than it's good for what ails you.
An Australian ski resort that is converting human waste into freshly driven snow. No shit.. really?
I write sig's like I know what I'm talking about.
The waste is converted "through a three-step purifying process of UV light filtration, ozonation and ultra-filtration", and they say it's "even cleaner than that made from nearby creek water."
Uhhh... why not just use the water from the nearby creek?
Did someone actually stand up at a board meeting and say, "No, let's not use the creek water, let's use human waste water instead!"
Now when you tell someone there's an "ice sheet" on the mountain, you may have to clarify what you mean...
Let me get this right: it has been purified three different ways, is pristine and clean, and people are still worried about it?!? One can only imagine what Freud could make of these "potty fetishes"!
We really have to think about what these "potty fetishes" are costing us. Here in the SF Bay Area, we are dumping literally millions of gallons of fresh, pure, clean water (cleaner than the the input sources)a day into the SF Bay. We are spending millions to try and protect the brakish marsh and watelands of the SF Bay from this invaison of fresh water. The open loop water economies that we practice through out the world are costing us a untold price economically and ecologically. Southern California, due to its cut off of Colorado River water by the Federal Government, will be setting up desilenation plants. If they wanted to do it cheaper, and with less ecologoical impact, they would start water recycling.
My call for economic and ecological reason is "Close the Loop! Drink Recycled Water!"
Why would anyone name it NEWater?
sounds too much like SEW(at)ER
(pronounced soo-otter)
Also, wouldn't OLDwater be more appropriate?
Just wonderin' ; )
If it's not one thing, it's Steve's Mother
Actually it makes perfect sense...just a different form of distilling.
If you could determine them, you could create conditions that make it ideal for water molecules to disengage from the organic material, and to crystallize with one another. You're left with snow in the air and a pile of crap on the ground.
Probably useful if you have a place and use for the snow, but my guess is it would be too expensive for long-term disposal.
jm2c, iana scientist.
The waste is converted "through a three-step purifying process of UV light filtration, ozonation and ultra-filtration", and they say it's "even cleaner than that made from nearby creek water." I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste."
So what.. what do you think happens to your waste water in general? It doesn't disappear, it gets purified and pumped back into whatever river or lake you get your drinking water from. People in bfe just pump it into the ground where it filters through the dirt and seeps back into their wells.
This has been a standard method for creating water for snowmaking at east coast U.S. ski resorts for more than 10 years. It's become a standard thing to do, because it's such a great conservation method - potable, clean water does not need to be wasted in the hundreds of thousands of gallons in order to give people something to slide on.
I remember hearing a warning to not eat the man-made snow because of more than just the dead bacteria they use as the 'dust mote' that needs to exist for moisture to cling to and freeze to to form snow flakes. The fact that the snowmaking water is handled with, and travels thru some relatively low-tech and rough and ready hydraulic equipment means it's contaminated with metal particles and greases on top of being non-potable recycled waste water to begin with!
The moral is, don't eat any snow from a resort that makes snow. There's never been any reason to think man-made snow might be as clean as natural.
For anyone who has been to a resort while they are making snow (which) involve large snowguns (the newer ones look like jet engines, old ones look like a big firehose) know it's not fun to have to ski by one of these things.
You better hope they filter everything out of there or you could be covered in some sort of virii or feces by product.
Isn't there something about not shitting where you eat? How bout not shitting where you make snow either.
All water at some point has to go through a water purification process. If you can drink water from the Amazon jungle after boiling it for 1/2 hour and/or using a few iodine tablets,
;)
Skiing on this snow shouldn't be a problem. Its not like you have to drink/eat the stuff. Urine is not hard to purify, there are much worse and much harder things to purify. I suppose there is a small psychological barrier to skiing on it at first.
If you're so paranoid about skiing on sanitized snow then I should mention you shouldn't taste your own sweat - it's 1 to 2 % urine. Another liitle known fact you probably didn't want to know
" I think that says more about the creek than it does the waste."
What, exactly?
Do you think there going to run it straight from the toilet to the snow maker?
In many cities, this is the norm. You can filter all the inpurities and end up with oure water. This is magic, it is a tried and true method of opperation.
But people are stupid. In LA, the city had a problem, It was paying a lot of money to ship recycled water it didn't have room to store. Somebody with a clue says "I know, instead of paying to ship water, why don't we just dump it into the ground water?" IMHO that was a good idea.
However, when the press found out about it, they said something like "City to put sewage into ground water" Naturally, people went nuts. So the water company had a press conference and said, "no, this is recycled waste. The same stuff we putinto the pipes". People still freaked out and where saying stuff like "I don't want that stuff polluting my ground water". The fact it came from the exact same place there tap water came from didn't seem to matter. sheesh.
FYI Los Angels water is very pure when it leaves the recycling plant, however the miles of rotten pipes it has to go through to get to your tap is getting pretty nasty, so use a filter.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Credit to the Rutland Herald, I believe, some 15 years ago and regarding the same bright idea.
I just had a little fun last night http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~fredh/piss.html
:)
For the curious... I did the deed, but that it's my gf's handwriting
...wouldn't it be more practical to use a lesser technology to simply filter the creekwater and let mother nature process the poo water elsewhere?
So if you get caught in an avalanche of this snow, you're truly in a world of shit...
"You done taken a wrong turn."
-Bill McKinney, in Deliverance
Ok so you kill all the bugs with some UV and stuff... wont it still be brown or yellow? I dunno about you but I avoid yellow snow like the plauge!
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
to accomplish this scientists modeled the system after Keith Richard's organs since they've somehow filtered out any and all existing drugs known to man.
This is a huge money saver for the ski resort, so now everytime I secrete bodily fluids, the ski resort will make money off of me! I think that they should pay me to pass of my waste.
They do this in a resort in VT too. The snow has a greyish color to it. I can't remember which place off the top of my hed...
What your talking about is filtering waste line water and redistributing it for irrigation. Using it for toilet water isn't so common. But as you know in southern cali all that greenry is do to irrigation which uses this water. Typically in a purple pvc line. So dont drink the water from the purple pvc pipe.
(moreso than the water used to make snow on certain ski slopes)
Hmm...seems some featured articles on Slashdot are like the human foetus--they must gestate for around 40 weeks before making an appearance. (Take a look at the article--last updated 12 APRIL 2002!? I watched a TV program on this EXACT CASE on the Discovery channel AGES ago.
Even before that--some YEARS ago--on (if I recall) the CBC about a site somewhere in the Northern US states or Canada about using snowmaking technology as a final stage in sewage disposal--spraying droplets of wastewater through snowmaker nozzels infused it with oxygen and caused flash-freezing which destroyed a great deal of the remaining bacterial contaminants. It wasn't donr on a ski slope, however, the additional nutrients and moisture made for a really good vegetable crop in the summer.
Mildly interesting as the subject is, recycling wastewater is not the latest, greatest groundbreaking in technology--and it's been happening implictly for ages. My city gets almost all it's drinking water from a river--which is downstream from a nomber of small towns. Our fair city drinks from the piss and crap of not only countless birds, fish, beavers and livestock--it drinks from that of tens of thousands of people as well. I pity those who live downstream of the city--they get to pull water from a river that is essentially the effluent from the waste of 1 MILLION people.
Novel and environmentally consious way of making snow? Sure. Hardly shocking or cutting edge though.
NEXT...
regular wastewater treatment plants in the US already do this through slightly different means. look up wastewater treatment on google. i took a course in college on it. we even got to visit a plant. it smelled bad.
Killington VT was going to do this....
Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
By the way, mods, this is NOT off topic. Well, maybe a little...
Geez, you'd think nobody'd ever taken a
science class. When you freeze water the
impurities are forced out of the crystal
structure. You can make freshwater from
seawater by "creating snow" with it.
Were that I say, pancakes?
...who invented that phrase anyway?
I know Zappa has used it once, and that there is some eeyuh-wee reference to it in some Dexter cartoon or something, but I just wonder where the phrase came from originally.
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
one mans shit is another mans lemonade!
I second that. My wife is a chemist at a waste water treatment plant, and knows the operation forwards and backwards (We kid around that she plays with poop for a living). Working at the plant and seeing how it works first hand has made her a strong advocate for using purified waste as drinking water.
She had some friends in a lab test the water at our house when we first moved in. The water coming out of the plant is cleaner than the water coming out of our tap, and our tap water is pretty darned good (at least for Florida). Meanwhile, our fair city is scraping for money to build a desalination plant. Go figure.
The technology is mature, proven, and robust. The only problem is public acceptance, but it's a huge problem. To even propose the idea would be political suicide for a mayor, which is ironic given that we have legislation passed (face-scanning cameras on city streets and puritanical blue laws) that makes the idea of drinking piss seem positively benign. If only we lived in a world where reason and freedom were valued over ignorance and politics!
-Cybrex
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!
Subject says it all - how is this considered news when it's almost a year old???
Must be time for a story about the Sydney Olympics or maybe the lunar landing...
This year they have been using the machines to hold back the flames.
This puts a whole new spin on the phrase "pure as the driven snow"! ;-)
This may be a semantic point to most people, but a reservior is usually for storing (relatively) clean water. Lagoons are used for anaerobic digestion of sludge.
Basically, once you get rid of the big stuff (flitering, letting it settle out, or grinding it in), the oil and scum (skimmed off the top), and the stuff that clumps together (floculation and letting it settle), you have two things -- relatively clear water, which is decanted off, and sludge.
If you take the sludge, and let it sit in an oxygen less environment, it'll break down further, but it produces methane as a byproduct. Sometimes, a lagoon is used, other times, they just warn it up in a controled environment.
Oh -- and for drinking water, there might be some de-hardening/de-ionizing done (depends on the source), some biological filtering, and some form of sanitizing (ozone or chlorine).
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Snowshit?
Use your head, can't you, use your head,
You're on earth, there's no cure for that - S. Beckett
Many (most?) ski resorts world wide do this. I know of several in Vermont at least. The problem is that making snow uses a LOT of water! The only limit to the amount of snow they can make IS the amount of water they can get. And the more snow they make the deeper their base is and longer they can stay open into the spring before it all melts off. SO naturally they want to get as much water as possible.
The ski areas already create huge artificial ponds simple for collecting water during the off season, and also tend to take as much as they can get from any local natural water supplies, such as lakes, rivers and streams. Of course a lot of big ski states like Vermont and Colorado also have a lot of environmentalists that bitterly oppose the ski areas sucking streams dry (which they will do, given the opportunity). So the ski areas tap their HUGE supply of otherwise wasted wastewater.
Environmentally this is great. They super-treat their wastewater and the spread it over a large area. I'm sure it's better for the environment than dumping halfass treated wastewater into natural bodies of water like most localities do.
As for the skiing, well, the snow IS of a somewhat ODD color and odour. YMMV, but I try not to fall down on it.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
perception...distilled water tastes FLAT. There is a NEED for a certain mineral balance to provide that 'Water' taste. I am sure there is need for a certain amount of biological micro-organisms in the water/food which would manifest itself in long term problems..ie digestive issues due to lack of something basic in your digestive track, but I have no real proof of it :) :)
:)
As far as re-use goes read Dune,now there was a society that got over the recycle/reuse fear, mmm nothing like a big swing of recycled urine and sweat to take the edge off your thirst, gimme one of those stillsuits please
BTW Seth, My uncle was an engineer at a Sanitation plant as well. He lead tours that capped off with him pulling a glass of water from a tap in the final treatment tank and taking a big swallow....amazingly VERY FEW people would take the offered drink
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
sunday river reuses its waste water in the snow. I'm assuming they purify it, of bacteria at least. they are a huge mountain, almost all covered by snowmaking, and they draw their water from a smallish river. one of the things that helps them meet their water needs is recycling it.
also -- dirty water makes better snow. not dirty as in bacteria-y, but with some (very small) particle stuff in it. it gives the water something to crystallize around when it freezes.
&&stuff;
BOFH excuse #145:
Flat tire on station wagon with tapes. ("Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurling down the highway" Andrew S. Tanenbaum)
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