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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
Now I can legitimately roll in my own filth!
:p
All the way down the mountain!
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.
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..
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.
Try again later!
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
They already have "snow" and "powder", now they get the "good clean shit" too....
:)
No wonder australians are so relaxed
i agree...the concept i'm referring to though, is the concept of water purified through man-made means, as opposed to nature which most people are more used to. in singapore's case, they're currently pumping the purified water into reservoirs, just to let it sit in the open so the birds and fish can crap into it and let nature do a bit of its thing, before purifying it again to pump into the water supply. all this, just to satisfy the odd inhibitions that a lot of people have to consuming purified sewage. weak-minded people really do bother me sometimes.
"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.
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.
Citizens figured the water's been through so many kidneys, it *has* to be pure....
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
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
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.
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
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 ]==--
the concept of water purified through man-made means, as opposed to nature which most people are more used to. in singapore's case, they're currently pumping the purified water into reservoirs, just to let it sit in the open so the birds and fish can crap into it and let nature do a bit of its thing, before purifying it again to pump into the water supply. all this, just to satisfy the odd inhibitions that a lot of people have to consuming purified sewage. weak-minded people really do bother me sometimes.
Don't be so hasty to cast stones. Clearly there is a double standard, born of ignorance on the part of many. A small ski resort I visited used to pump icky water from a swamp and make snow from it. You could tell because the air smelled terrible when they were doing it and the snow had a yellowish tinge from algae. However, look at what advertising has told the consumer:
Beer from the land of sky blue waters (can you name it? :-)
Mountain spring water (yeah, right... all 50 zillion gallons of it every day, that's no spring it's a river, in Cal. it's probably pumped from Colorado or Owens River, read Cadillac Desert)
Then there's the simple test of putting two glasses of water in front of someone, filtered from the town well and recovered water. Don't tell them before they taste test, then see if they make a face and call a lawyer once you've explained one came from recovered water.
People have been trained, since before the Bible to avoid water touched by human waste, because bacteria and fungi which cause some pretty bad aflictions grow in it. That was wisdom, it may seem misguided, until you run a marketing campaign to change people's opinion, then catch the local water filtration manager cutting corners. It's probably happening in your town and you don't even know it.
Me, I put a filter on my drinking water, for whatever good it does. Which it does to some small noticable degree.
Water is getting poorer in quality and reuse isn't a new concept, but reuse is growing and people will need to accept it, because alternatives (desalination, for example) can be very expensive.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Good time to mention the book "The Great Stink of London" (Amazon) which is about the development of the London sewer system.
The above was one of the problems - the futher down the Thames you got, the more crap (litterally) there was in the water. Though, since the Thames is a tidal river it went both ways.
An interesting read.
actually i live in singapore...sorry if i gave you the wrong impression. currently, the water purified through some method called "reverse-osmosis" or something similar, has been tested in a laboratory to be cleaner than the water we currently consume, and as it is the water here is already clean enough to be consumed straight from the tap. i drink water straight from the tap all the time without any ill effects so much so that i've gotten used to it to the point, that when i went to china a few years ago my local host looked appalled when i proceeded to do the same there. apparently the water has to be boiled at least once before it is safe for consumption.
;)
anyway i didn't mean to imply that the ski resort would purify water to the same standards that singapore does. i agree that they probably wouldn't, since it wouldn't be cost-effective. i was just attempting to dismiss the eek factor a lot of people have with reclaimed water, despite the fact that it can be cleaner than most forms of potable water today.
by the way, singapore's utilities services are strictly government monitored, and even small screw-ups are widely publicised. a few years ago a sewage pipe in an apartment buildling leaked raw sewage into the water pipes due to lack of maintenance, resulting in some people being hospitalized. the case was plastered all over the newspapers and i'm sure some heads were rolling after that, as they rightfully should
Snowmelt/rainfall fills the stream or aquifer your water comes from (exceptions, like L.A., where it's pumped hundreds of miles _into_ an aquifer)
You live in city D, downstream from Cities A, B, C.
City A uses the water, some of it is treated then fed to streams or back into wells.
City B does the same thing.
City C does the same thing.
All this use increases mineral content of the water, since minerals are disolved into water, not chunks you can filter out. Most can only be removed by energy intensive evaporation.
In City D you turn on the tap and out comes a glass of water with the accumulated minerals, trace elements, pollutants it has acquired on its journey.
Most cities grow, thus increasing their need for water.
The mineral and other chemical content compounds.
There is a treaty between the US and Mexico governing use of the Colorado River, as concentration of salts in water have, in the past, reached levels which were harmful to mexican agriculture. Recently L.A. lost access to Mono Lake water (because they were draining it almost completely), more recently Southern California has lost access to extra shares of Colorado River water, unused by upstream states, until now.
In short, the more water is used after it falls from the clouds, the more things accumulate in it. Biologicals can be treated out, but salts and chemicals are much more difficult. Pumping water into wells, to "purify" water has resulted in their decreasing effectiveness.
Granted, in the eastern US and other regions which receive greater rain and snowfall, it's less of an issue (so far.)
When I was much younger I heard of some Army Corps of Engineers plan to run a pipeline from Lake Michigan to the California. I thought it was just another goofy rumor. After reading Cadillac Desert, I found it wasn't just proposed, but the Great Lake States fought it.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
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!"
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