Posted on 09/08/2018 2:57:42 PM PDT by sodpoodle
A Dubai-based engineering firm wants to tow icebergs from Antarctica to Dubai in order to provide the city with a reserve of fresh drinking water.
The firm will use satellite imagery to select candidate icebergs. It's eyeing icebergs that are between 2,000 and 7,000 feet long, and weigh around 100 million tons.
But the plan is short on details: the firm doesn't know exactly how it will get the icebergs to Dubai, or how the icebergs will be stored.
What do you do if you're a fast-growing city in the desert with lots of thirsty people and little freshwater reserves? Park an iceberg off the coast
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Good god! They’re sitting next to tons of water, and with tons of money, why not desalination?
“A 7,000 foot long iceberg would be difficult to tow, and by the time it arrived in Dubai would probably fit into a styrofoam cooler.”
Wonder if the engineering company is considering use of US Patent 4334873, which suggests using the melting ice to propel an iceberg - combination of a water from the top of the iceberg providing some energy and using a heat cycle engine with the temperature difference of the seawater and iceberg. Don’t know if anyone has really worked out the numbers to see if more than the cooler would finish the trip - but theoretically feasible.
Despite the problems and the later unnecessary cute kid, so did I.
The first season open especially.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mR-gz9EFO8
They talk about transmission losses with electricity...imagine the skipper of whatever boat looking back and saying, “ It was there a minute ago!”
But, but, but....
What if they do too any icebergs? The Persian Gulf could freeze over! And next the Arabian Sea!!!
The solution is simple. Tow the ice to Dubai. Then pack it in sawdust. Oh, wait. That won’t work, Dubai doesn’t have any trees. Maybe they could use camel dung.
Aruba uses desalination to provide drinking water for their entire island. They use coral to mineralized the water. Best water I’ve ever had.
Think that is a better idea than an iceberg.
Agree. They need to talk to the officials in Aruba.
Actually the ideas for this have been around for a long time, and are all existing technologies. First you cover the iceberg with an insulating cover, like a tarp, that reduces the melt rate. The water from the melting ice provides the impulse to move the iceberg, with some external engines to slowly direct its course. Once near its destination, tugboats take over.
Finally, you take advantage of the ocean currents when you can.
You also need a suitable dock for an iceberg, with an ice processing facility and a lined, covered freshwater lake for storage. Then pumping stations and pipelines to pump the fresh water inland.
Because about 90% of an iceberg is under water, you harvest it from the top.
A good-sized iceberg might measure 3,000 x 1,500 x 600 feet. An iceberg that size contains somewhere around 20 billion gallons of fresh water. If 1 million people each use 10 gallons of water a day, then 20 billion gallons of water would take care of the water needs of 1 million people for more than five years. For 10 million people, it would last 200 days. It really is a lot of water.
The outer layers of ice should provide adequate insulation. The ratio of surface area to volume is inversely proportional to volume. Being that ice is white it pretty effectively reflects sunlight.
I find the possibilities interesting.
Using icebergs towed to some destination for fresh water ... the idea is decades or more old. I think Popular Science even covered it way back when maybe 40 years ago
Because they’re Muslims and the greatest experts in desalination are the Jews, who also hold many key patents.
They prefer draught over irrigation and thirst over water if Israel would profit.
“A 7,000 foot long iceberg would be difficult to tow, and by the time it arrived in Dubai would probably fit into a styrofoam cooler.”
yep. this cool “idea” of towing icebergs thousands of miles has been floated at least once a decade for the last 50 years ... (reader can decide if all the puns are intended or not ...)
I would like to see the tugs they intend to use. Aint gonna happen, currents and all.
Now a smaller one? Maybe.
Don’t seem to work with ice cubes in bourbon. Maybe I should use bigger cubes and paint them white with whiteout.
THINK OF THE PENGUINS !!!!
Enviromentalists are against desalination because they think tossing the salt back into the vast ocean will alter the water:salt ratio. Seriously.
So the iceberg idea will provide cold water. Where are they going to find hot water? ;)
“A 7,000 foot long iceberg would be difficult to tow, and by the time it arrived in Dubai would probably fit into a styrofoam cooler.”
Wonder if the engineering company is considering use of US Patent 4334873, which suggests using the melting ice to propel an iceberg - combination of a water from the top of the iceberg providing some energy and using a heat cycle engine with the temperature difference of the seawater and iceberg. Don’t know if anyone has really worked out the numbers to see if more than the cooler would finish the trip - but theoretically feasible.
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