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Bill Gates Endorses Water From Human Waste
theodp writes: GeekWire reports that Bill gates is certainly leading by example, appearing in a video in which he sips "a glass of delicious drinking water" produced from human waste processed by Janicki Bioenergy's OmniProcessor, which can take sewer sludge and turn it into clean drinking water, electricity and clean ash. So how was it? "The water tasted as good as any I've had out of a bottle," said Bill. "And having studied the engineering behind it, I would happily drink it every day. It's that safe."
I mean the guy already excelled at selling SHIT to people for years...
Water's water - given the diffusion time we're probably all drinking King Tut's piss today (not to mention plenty of other peoples/animals).
Ever wonder why water treatment plants smell so bad?
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
You can now throw all your piss jugs out at Bill's place or at MSFT HQ.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Bear Grylls could not be reached for comment.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
I just pictured Sinofsky dropping tiles of pure gold, all over the formerly pristine surface, while Ballmer watched and chanted. "Developers, developers, developers..."
Stillsuit is the obvious application of this.
http://www.dilbert.com/2012-11...
Code name: water
He who shitteth first shitteth last.
--
Fish poop in it.
(attr: William Claude Dukenfield)
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Remember, that delicious tap water was once pooped in by a dinosaur.
There are 10 kinds of people: ones who understand ternary, ones who don't, and ones who think this joke is about binary
Where do people think their water comes from? Dependent on your location it is either pulled from a dam / river / ocean which has shit, corpses (animal and human), bacteria and all sorts of nasties or it comes from a waste water treatment plant after the solid waste has been removed.
The process is the same, ram the water under pressure against a membrane. Water goes through, other stuff doesn't. The biggest challenge is actually the medication that goes into the waste water system. It generally means that the solid waste that is removed by your treatment plant can't be used directly without additional treatment.
This could make more money than Microsoft. How many people on the planet would gladly pay $20 to get to piss and crap in a box and have Bill drink it. Sign me up.
Why whinge? We've been sipping his human software waste for nearly 30 years! Where's this different?
Yes, it creates electricity, water, and activated sludge... What heats the sludge? Do they start an oil based fire, and then use off-gassing from the sludge to continue the reaction?
This is a great development in a field that will likely save billions of lives. But do they really need to portray it as "produced from human waste", rather than "filtered out of sewage"? The former makes me imagine some sort of artificial process that involves bleaching poop until it's transparent then bottling it.
"The water tasted as good as any I've had out of a bottle,"
That's a pretty low bar, as anyone accustomed to drinking fresh mountain spring water can tell you. I suppose it frequently tastes a better than metropolitan city water though...
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
This has been going on for billions of years.
I've often wanted to tell Bill to eat shit. So, there's something vaguely satisfying in seeing him drink it.
Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Inventor of steaming shit is ok with drinking piss!
From BG blog one can conclude that the author belongs to the category of people unclear about the difference between a quantity of energy and a rate of energy production. To his excuse the common poor choice of kWh instead of the SI J (Joule J, 1 kWh = 3.6 MJ) as energy unit is just making energy discussions more confusing.
Why would anyone want to turn waste into drinking water and electricity?
Because a shocking number of people, at least 2 billion, use latrines that aren't properly drained. Others simply defecate out in the open. The waste contaminates drinking water for millions of people, with horrific consequences: Diseases caused by poor sanitation kill some 700,000 children every year, and they prevent many more from fully developing mentally and physically.
If we can develop safe, affordable ways to get rid of human waste, we can prevent many of those deaths and help more children grow up healthy.
Western toilets aren't the answer, because they require a massive infrastructure of sewer lines and treatment plants that just isn't feasible in many poor countries.
One idea is to reinvent the toilet, which I've written about before.
Another idea is to reinvent the sewage treatment plant.
Today, in many places without modern sewage systems, truckers take the waste from latrines and dump it into the nearest river or the ocean --- or at a treatment facility that doesn't actually treat the sewage. Either way, it often ends up in the water supply. If they took it to the Omniprocessor instead, it would be burned safely. The machine runs at such a high temperature (1000 degrees Celsius) that there's no nasty smell; in fact it meets all the emissions standards set by the U.S. government.
Before we even started the tour, I had a question: Don't modern sewage plants already incinerate waste? I learned that some just turn the waste into solids that are stored in the desert. Others burn it using diesel or some other fuel that they buy. That means they use a lot of energy, which makes them impractical in most poor countries.
The Omniprocessor solves that problem. Through the ingenious use of a steam engine, it produces more than enough energy to burn the next batch of waste. In other words, it powers itself, with electricity to spare. The next-generation processor, more advanced than the one I saw, will handle waste from 100,000 people, producing up to 86,000 liters of potable water a day and a net 250 kw of electricity.
From Poop To Potable: This Ingenious Machine Turns Feces Into Drinking Water
We drink filtered rain water from our tank, beautiful.
After drinking some really bad water from various water treatment plants in cities and towns around Australia, can't go past rain water.
There are a few water recycling plants in SE Queensland, but generally for non-drinking purposes.
All my life I've known water is the most important ingredient for life.
I thought Bill was a straight, never picked him for watersports (urophilia)
Go well
Very convincing. I may never go to Adrica again.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Did anyone really think Bill Gates would have the opinion "We can never drink water molecules that used to have poop next to them. That's just gross."
People can be skeptical whether a particular water purification process is adequate, but anyone who thinks water can't be purified is just an idiot and probably also homophobic (i.e. the category of people who are compelled to irrationality regarding things that seem gross to them).
Say what you want about Bill Gates, but he doesn't seem like the type to be idiotically irrational.
We normally use the natural biology of streams to do this. One town dumps their sewage plant output (clean enough it won't kill you, but not healthy) into a stream. The next town picks up this same water and pulls it into a water plant. In between is the missing step, biology at work.
In the 50's, a severe drought caused a small town in Kansas to pipe their sewage plant into their water plant. I do not know what happened, but it did not last long. But, it is now in the engineering textbooks. I thought there were desert towns in the US already doing this?
If he is investing in this tech, does that mean he just put his mouth where his money is? ;)
(captcha: maggots.)
640 pollutants ought to be enough for anybody.
This is not the sig you're looking for.
There was a guy on ./ years ago with the sig "re-eat your corn".
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
That says Tommy Lee can do this in some sort of perpetual circle. Whatever that means.
Pretending this is my office full of bitter coworkers..
With that, Gates opened himself up for Windows jokes wider than goatse
Table-ized A.I.
... is Windows9?
Who cares if you can distill clean drinking water from human excrement? What matters is, is it economical?
Many, big cities have been recycling sewage for decades. It started in the 1970s. Why is this news?
The oceans are still 90% fish pee.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Bill Gates Endorses Water From Human Waste
--
Bill endorsing it is a start. If perhaps the pope could also bless it, that might make it potable.
-Dave
Urine is not shit water ;-)
It was made from sewage, not just urine. It's literally water derived from shit.
Wealth is the gift that keeps on giving.
I guess I expect more intellegence from slashdot readers, it used to be that way any way.
Comments about "Gates selling shit" and "its faked" do nothing except show that you are ignorant and childish. What comes out of that unit is both distilled and then filtered (probably some sort of reverse osmosis filter that could do an ok job of cleaning the water on its own.) Since it is distilled there is no bacteria in it unless it it has been recontaminated further down the line.
The whole point of this is that there are plenty of places in the world with not much in the line of clean drinkable water. People live in those places. Poor people living in poor countries that can't afford (or chose not to) provide clean drinking water to thier people. Those peoples health and well being would be greatly improved by having safe clean water available. Their lifestyle and economic well being would be greatly improved if that water was available somewhere close to where they live.
Here is a solution that will take something that is found in abundance everywhere humans and their animals live and turn it in to something that is needed and desired enough that a person may be able to make a living running the thing. It is a solution that a small company (or village) could afford, as opposed to something costing tens of millions of dollars.
Here is a link to the web site of a small town in the US that just spent $21 million on a treatment plant plus another 30 million on sewage lines:
https://www.gocolumbiamo.com/P...
How many little third world villages do you suppose can raise $51 million?
Way to go Mr Gates!
Every wrong attempt discarded is a step forward - T. Edison
Are water's most recent memories the most strong?
As necessary about the water filter ration system on the ISS, it turns yesterday's coffee into tomorrow's coffee. Seriously though I am in LA and they're such focus on water efficiency of the people are seriously thinking of this.
Take a chill pill!
Time for bed, said Zebedee - boing
Where can I donate My "water" for Bill Gates drinking supply? I would be happy to keep him well hydrated.
I expected bodies hurled in a mechanical squeezer the soylent green way.
Bullshit.
Really? Wake me up when they stop watering their lawns and start wearing stillsuits.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
There are several problems which have caused what you refer to as childish comments.
:- :
1) Gates is involved. Gates is a proven corporate rogue who, while a significant section of the World's population admire him (generally those more ignorant of his history, some even thinking he invented computers), he only generates dislike and cynicism among those concerned about his history of cheating and extortion. They see his "green" and "humanitarian" activities merely as an attempt to repair his bad reputation.
2) Technology for recycling sewerage has existed for years. Gates is posing as if he were involved in a new inverntion.
3) There are some simple low-tech solutions to these problems. Water shortages tend to occur where settlements have sprung up in areas in past times where water was adequate (they would not have been settled otherwise) but it has since ceased to be, or because a past irrigation/water supply system has broken down through neglect.. A better solution might be for the people to give it up and move to a location nearer a river from which water can easily be piped (using wind pumps) and filtered much more easily than sewerage can. In fact they may already be near enough.
Plastic piping is really quite cheap, wind pumps are low-tech, and the rivers of the world currently dump vast quantities of fresh water into the sea every day. I understand that there are stacks of plastic pipes in some African villages, put there by humanitarians for making water supplies, that no-one has actually bothered to assemble. What is needed is some organisation and effort, perhaps by the villagers themselves. So what chance of maintaining Gates' apparatus?
I am probably one of those you consider unintelligent, childish etc as I have made some critical comments earlier, but keep it going because I feel very secure against that. Just to make sure here it is again
Gates talks shit, sells shit, and is a shit.
In "Dune", to spit onto the ground was considered to be a way of showing ultimate approval. Water being so scarce on the desert planet, you just didn't waste water unless you meant to prove your point by a small spit on the ground. Future generations may look back on us and wonder how we could just waste water so easily.
As clear as it gets!
Some people were seriously admiring his forced mosquito laser non-solution for solving things that DDT effectively solves.
But no, we must think of the children or whatever crap instead of using proven solutions.
I endorse population control so I don't have to drink someone's PISS
I'm surprised 2girls1cup has yet to be mentioned. How about meme recycling?; )
--TheOrangeSquid Is it any wonder things seem so awry? We swim in a sea of confusion and don't have to think to survive
Growing up in SE lower Michigan, most of the municipal water was provided by the Detroit metro water supply, which for years was considered one of the best (quality) water systems in the country. (perhaps not so anymore, based on some recent news articles) The water is collected from the middle of Lake Huron, north of Port Huron. There are thousands of cottages along the lakeshore, with many of them having septic systems which empty into the lake. However, sunlight is good at sterilizing water (eventually), and there is a LOT of water in the Great Lakes (~20% of the world's fresh water), so what goes into the pipe is pretty good, even before the filtering and chlorination process.
I still wouldn't drink the lake water unprocessed, but I never had any concern about swimming/skiing in it. Which inevitably means I swallowed some, as I am not a very good water skier.
McFly777
- - -
"What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
like most things once it's a large scale business somebody is going to look to cut corners. You don't do it directly. You just cut everybody's budgets until it happens "out of sight, out of mind". Heck, you don't even need to cut their budgets, just don't _raise_ them and wait for inflation to do it for you. At 2-5% every year that's a nice profit margin increase.
So you don't check/change the filtration equipment as much anymore. Your guys are working 16 hour shifts for 20% less than minimum wage 5 years ago thanks to inflation and driving them to work more hours. Suddenly stuff gets into the water that shouldn't. Maybe a few people get sick, maybe a few over 50 die....
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Municipal water works already do this. they filter river water
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
It's funny how the American voices the video and we're given no help understanding his nasty accent, but for the couple of sentences from the African man (who is perfectly clear) we get huge karaoke text taking up half the screen.
#whydotheyhateus
I am probably one of those you consider unintelligent, childish etc
Yep, and nothing you have said has changed that opinion.
The City of San Diego operated a pilot plant in Mission Valley near Jack Murphy Stadium to process wastewater into drinking water. It worked. I was a Water Plant Operator and know the process is safe when waste plant operators follow the proper procedures. The water produced was just returned to a sewer line 'cause it wasn't allowed to be used for drinking. A local news guy did a feature about the plant and took a drink from a gallon jug of recycled water. All hell broke loose. The State officials went crazy! Another pilot plant used chlorine and UV to disinfect water. That worked, the water lab sampled and tested three times/day.
Future generations will have probably implemented technology that allows for the use of saltwater without expensive or complicated desalinzation and will have implemented systems that recycle blackwater into usable water, so I doubt they'll wonder how we could just waste water so easily.
After all, we don't look at ancient Rome's always-on fountains fed by aqueducts in that light, even though they had no off-valve.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
In other news:
Windows 10 gets released this week.
Future generations may look back on us and wonder how we could just waste water so easily.
Because this isn't Arrakis, and most of the Earth's surface is covered in water, which will still be there for future generations as long as we don't find a way to effeciently fuse normal hydrogen for energy.
They also filter the waste water to similar standards, at least in the US, though I know some central american countries do not.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
Well not really an XKCD but a What-If.
"As certain as the changing of the tides is the utter putrescence of what lies beneath them. Caked with filth, brimming with urine and home to some of the world's most vile creatures, tidal zones are nature's symbiotic waste dumps."
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nwz37vF-BI4
Why're ya avoiding & downmodding this Barb http://slashdot.org/comments.p... ? You troll apk http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... n' you can't back it up? Yes.
In most of the world, clean fresh water simply isn't a rare resource. Globally, the stuff is so abundant that humanity really couldn't "waste" it if we actively tried.
The problem is that moving water is expensive, and in some specific places water is *locally* rare. In those places water conservation makes sense, because the alternatives are really expensive. But that doesn't mean anyone should be worrying about water supplies in, say, the eastern US.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
While I don't know definitively if this is true or not, I did spend some time deployed out in a desert and it was most fascinating that the water bottling facility was on one side of a brick wall and the sewer treatment facility was located on the other side of the wall. ... I don't think that was by accident.
that means I can be my own recirculating system
Yes, this has been going on for a long time now. How is this new?
I art more snarky, and terse than thou. I art Slashdot!
I won't kiss him - that's for sure