We NEED a pipeline in America

[sorefeet]

but it needs to built from east to west and would carry flood waters and massive excess rain to the Colorado river and let nature take it from there to California/Nevada. It will make and keep more jobs than an oil line. And we might need it for food some day.

[liberal N proud]

1. Great Lakes ‘ground zero’ for water needs

Climate change and population growth are making the Great Lakes region’s role as a global food producer more important as water shortages become more severe in other parts of the world.

But even though some agribusinesses within this water-blessed region have growing concerns about future water availability, that message may be hard for area residents to fathom in the short-term because of an unusually long bout of thunderstorms this summer.

“The coming water crisis will affect everyone and everywhere, including everyone and every community in the Great Lakes region and basin,”said Jim Olson, a Traverse City water-rights lawyer.

The Great Lakes are positioned to become “ground zero” as water vanishes elsewhere. The region has long been viewed as one of the world’s most abundant collections of fresh water and would be in a crucial position to adapt to a global water crisis.

The Great Lakes are North America’s largest lakes by volume, holding 20 percent of all fresh surface water on Earth. Their 6 quadrillion gallons are enough to submerge the entire continental United States in five feet of water. They are the source of drinking water for 30 million Americans and 10 million Canadians.

Read more at http://www.toledoblade.com/local/2013/07/14/Great-Lakes-ground-zero-for-water-needs.html#GEzxp1UEZQT5gE0s.99

So we are going to drain the great lakes which are at record low levels already.

[Octafish]

23. That's the picture. Like the time the oil producing states sent heating oil north to keep us warm.

People may not remember, but it was very touching, the outpouring of support and love, the bumper stickers:

"Drive 85. Freeze a Yankee."

[Vashta Nerada]

28. Good god, I hope they don't drain the Great Lakes.

[SidDithers]

46. They can't. The Great Lakes are protected by international treaty...

The US isn't free to divert Great Lakes waters without Canadian permission (and vice versa).

Sid

[Vashta Nerada]

52. Oh good.

I know Arizona wanted Great Lakes water to water their golf courses.

That seemed like an appropriate use of water.

[meow2u3]

2. Floodwater pipelines? Sounds ideal, but how would it work?

Wouldn't we have to have a nationwide network of floodwater pipelines to transport water from flooded areas to irrigate drought-stricken regions nationwide?

Let's say the East Coast becomes flooded while the Midwest gets hit with a drought. Wouldn't we have to have a floodwater pipeline built from east to west from the Appalachians?

[sorefeet]

4. That is my thought

a network of piping, holding ponds and pump stations. that would regulate flooded areas and capture excess storm waters. Like when the Mississippi floods. Ways to funnel water where needed.

[Jamastiene]

65. Well, there could be taps in areas that historically have drought problems.

So, areas along the way suffering from drought could take some water. People would need to work those taps. That's more jobs to regulate the water flow according to need and a better way to make sure the pipeline had maintenance along the way as well. That would be a good idea.

[A HERETIC I AM]

72. No.

Pipelines would not work. Aqueducts however.....

[Chan790]

3. We'd create more permanent jobs and have a greater impact...

exploring ways to more-cheaply desalinate seawater, building desalination plants to produce potable water and then piping it from the coastlines. It would also be more-regularized and not dependent upon resources outside our control...the weather.

Houston to West Texas and the lower Midwest.

Pacific to inland California and Nevada.

Lower Pacific, San Diego to the Four Corners area.

Pensacola to the inland South.

[Spider Jerusalem]

5. That's just not practical.

Water going from the East to the Colorado River would have to go uphill over the Rockies. The US Bureau of Reclamation had a plan for moving water from the Missouri River to the Colorado for Denver; pumping 600,000 acre-feet (one acre-foot = 325K gallons) of water uphill to an elevation of 4400 feet requires something like 5 GIGAWATT-HOURS of electricity. It was projected that it'd need 8 nuclear power stations to generate enough electricity.

[sorefeet]

6. That don't stop them from pumping

oil all over the planet. Water is lighter and there is a siphoning effect.

[SidDithers]

8. Where does oil get pumped with a similar elevation change?...nt

Sid

[Spider Jerusalem]

11. There are no oil pipelines anywhere...

that travel uphill to an elevation of a mile over a distance of a thousand miles.

[mikeysnot]

27. Pipelines in Afghanistan?

Mountainous region, high elevation, and we don't have to go over them, go through them...

Talk about a Works Project...

[Spider Jerusalem]

36. Those are natural gas pipelines.

Gas moves via compression and it doesn't require nearly as much energy to transport as dense crude oil.

[mikeysnot]

62. If the pipeline bursts from water their is no long term environmental disasters on our hands...

[oldhippie]

17. (sigh) ......

Oil is not pumped "all over the planet." Water is not lighter than oil. That's why oil forms slicks and floats on water.

[yellowcanine]

19. How is water "lighter?" Oil floats on water. And being fluids, they both will siphon.

You need to do a little more research on this, your information is just not correct. The reason long distance pipelines are built for oil is that it is worth more than water and not as widely distributed as water. You really can't compare the two.

[sorefeet]

53. VISCOSITY it's much easier to move

than oil. Push water through a garden hose or push oil through a garden hose, water is easier, less friction.

[yellowcanine]

59. Viscosity would be the least of your problems in pumping flood water thousands of miles.

How about sediment wear on your pumps and sediment collecting in low lying sections of pipe, elbows, etc?

[B Calm]

7. Pumping station powered by the sun. After all

we did put a man on the moon once. We can still do great things!

[Spider Jerusalem]

9. And how much investment and energy will that take?

Are you aware that there's a treaty with Canada that bans any transfer of water out of the Great Lakes basin? Or that the level of the Great Lakes has decreased to the point where it's causing problems for navigation? Or that the Mississippi has had similar low water levels? There are lots of reasons why pumping water from the Mississippi/Great Lakes/Canada is fantastically stupid; the energy needed to do it is just one of those reasons.

[sorefeet]

12. Fine then lets do nothing

then see what kind of investment will be needed.

[Spider Jerusalem]

15. So...

why spend billions or trillions and wreak widespread environmental destruction to divert water to support cities of millions of people and water-intensive agriculture in a desert? Is this a sensible course of action? Is this the best possible use of those resources?

[yellowcanine]

42. And of course the only choice is: "Build pipelines" of "Do Nothing."

Seriously, in addition to some basic environmental education you also need an education in logic. Look up "false choice" for starters. http://www.logicallyfallacious.com/index.php/logical-fallacies/94-false-dilemma

[B Calm]

21. Subterranean rivers

Right now there is a subterranean river that runs though the Wabash Valley that provides water to hundreds of corporations and people.

[Spider Jerusalem]

25. And?

A river that flows underground naturally is one thing. It isn't practical to drill a channel across a distance of a thousand miles to divert one. If there were any subterranean rivers of substantial flow in the Colorado basin they'd already have been utilised.

[yellowcanine]

37. Underground rivers are actually quite rare. Most underground water is in aquifers.

Yes the water flows down hill, but very slowly as the flow is impeded by sediment and rock particles of varying permeability as well as impermeable rock.

[oldhippie]

14. There you go again ......

.... Going all "engineer" on the poor people. They don't want to hear it.

Seriously, that would be an interesting calculation. I might work on that this afternoon if I get bored.

[Spider Jerusalem]

16. Here's a good baseline:

It takes about 185 kWh of electrical energy to raise one acre-foot (AF) of water an elevation of 100 feet. This answer assumes an overall pumping plant efficiency of 55.4%. Friction losses in the piping system are neglected.

Southern California Edison published a paper in the 1999 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Industry that provides results from over 28,000 pump efficiency tests performed between 1990 and 1997. The paper, "We've Been Testing Water Pumps for Years—Has Their Efficiency Changed?" reported overall average pumping plant efficiencies (wire-to-water) of 55.4% for centrifugal booster pumps, 58.4% for submersible booster pumps, 44.2% for submersible well pumps, 62.8% for turbine booster pumps, and 56.4% for turbine well pumps.

Energy savings from pumping plant efficiency improvements can be substantial. If the efficiency of the pumping plant discussed above is increased from 55.4% (E1) to 75% (E2), the annual energy consumption is reduced by 26.1%. Mathematically, the energy savings are expressed as:

Energy Savings = 185 kWh/AF x (1 - E1 / E2) = 185 x (1 - 0.7386) = 48.3 kWh/AF

Reduction in Energy Use = 48.3 kWh/AF / 185 kWh/AF x 100% = 26.1%

http://energyexperts.org/EnergySolutionsDatabase/ResourceDetail.aspx?id=2476

[sorefeet]

40. Why does it have to go through the

high Rockies. Didn't say nothing about the Great lakes. That wasn't where I wanted to get the water.

[Spider Jerusalem]

41. Have you looked at a map?

See that line down the middle of the country where it's green-brown on one side and orange on the other? That's the Continental Divide. That's just about the 100th meridian. The orange is between 2000 and 5000 feet above sea level.

[sorefeet]

48. Interesting, I always thought the Continental Divide was

up through the middle of the Rockies. At least that is where I am every time I cross it. According to the signs. I learn something new every day.

[Spider Jerusalem]

50. Sorry, not the Continental Divide, the 20-inch rainfall line.

The area west of that is what used to be called "The Great American Desert".

[laundry_queen]

51. You are correct. The Continental divide is through the Rockies. nt

[JackInGreen]

10. I'm sorry

I thought you meant a long chain of passing pipes from one hand to another between Washington and Colorado, I'll just toddle off now.

[yellowcanine]

13. No we don't. Read the history of Southern California and water issues.

The environmental impact of what you are suggesting is devastating. It would be far more energy efficient and cost effective to implement strict water conservation and recycling - and possibly use solar powered desalination where needed. Also, just because an area is flooding doesn't mean they have water to spare. Severe flooding is often a result of mismanaged flood control projects (such as dam and levee construction, river channeling, draining wetlands, etc). Watershed restoration projects could greatly reduce a lot of the worst of the flooding.

[Spider Jerusalem]

18. Floodwater is water that's not being absorbed into the aquifer.

It exceeds the absorption level of the soil and the drainage and runoff capacity of rivers and streams. It doesn't really represent "excess available water".

[yellowcanine]

26. Exactly. Not to mention the logistics of pumping away flood water.

Kind of like trying to empty a 50 gallon fish tank with a straw while water is still flowing in from a faucet. Even if it were possible no one is going to do it.

[freebrew]

38. Floodwater re-energizes the soil...

as disastrous as it is for us humans at the time, floods get rid of old soil and brings new toe the flooded area.
Flooded topsoil in the Mississippi valley is some of the best farmland in the world. Flooding is the reason.

Take away the floodwater and this stops. But then what does it matter when they build airports on it?

Never mind.

[2naSalit]

55. In addition

what about all the pollutants that are present in flood water? How does that get economically separated out along the way?

[Enthusiast]

47. I think large scale solar powered desalination is a great idea.

[Mr.Bill]

77. To provide drinking water for coastal cities, maybe.

But to irrigate California's agricultural powerhouse known as the San Joaquin valley, not practical.

[Enthusiast]

78. I'm not so sure. Where there is a will, there is a way. I believe it is practical.

The problem is that lack of will.

The Pacific Ocean holds a lot of water. And if solar power is inadequate for the task there are several proposed tidal energy systems that could be employed.

Ocean currents are inexhaustible. These currents could be harnessed to provide an unlimited volume of desalinated water.

Of course proponents of nuclear and coal fired generation would poo poo the idea of alternative energy. I poo poo their nay sayer ways.

[Mr.Bill]

81. You are talking about massive amounts of water to irrigate the valley.

I think it would cost an unimaginable amount of money for such a system to be built.

[Enthusiast]

82. It would cost an unimaginable amount of money

to build the most powerful military the world has ever seen. It would take an unimaginable amount of money to build a pipeline to move water across the nation.

It requires the will to do it. The payoff would be enormous.

[Mr.Bill]

83. Then that would be a federal issue

and not a state issue. I admit I was sort of posting on the tangent of what California can do about it's drought problems. There is a long list of what the federal government could do with the money we waste on the military, which is currently serving the purpose of creating enemies around the world. On this I think we agree.

[Enthusiast]

84. Yes. Since the demise of the Soviet Union

it has been necessary for the military industrial complex to get creative in inventing reasons to justify their gigantic size and expense. Join the Army, help create some future foreign enemies today!

[snooper2]

20. You could start it in Vermont and let it run Southwest, downhill to San Diego

[yellowcanine]

22. Good one but you better add a sarcasm smile or someone will take you seriously.

But it looks downhill on a map?

[snooper2]

24. This is the goofiest thing I've read in a long time, but I'll work with you on it LOL

So..


First question-

What is the diameter of this pipe going to be? A foot? 10 foot? 30?

Second question-

You ever actually see something like the Mississippi flood?



Third question-

Have you ever actually taken something like an advanced fluid dynamics class?

[sorefeet]

34. Nope, GED education

don't know why I even opened my mouth. Besides I have the Yellowstone river behind my house and I have my own well. So I will always have a garden and plenty of food AND water. Why am I concerning myself with the future.

[Egalitarian Thug]

75. That's the problem, isn't it? Some of us have or are in the process of taking care of

ourselves, but put forth an idea to help others and this is what you get.

I'm pretty much in the fuck 'em all camp, now. We'll find the place and open it up to a few useful and sane people and let the rest slaughter each other.

[Vashta Nerada]

29. We need to quit wasting water and build desalinization plants.

[HereSince1628]

30. Isn't it really cheaper to move people to water?

Setting aside the difficulties over-turning international agreements that preclude removing water from the Great Lakes basin...

Eastern floods don't really last long and consequently don't produce a sustainably reliable surplus.

The consumption of water from the Wisconsin, Illinois and the Iowa is already somewhat greater than their flows. This situation is possible only because cities along their course essentially recycle as drinking water "waste"water.

Because eastern surface water is already fully utilized, diverting water to west of the Rockies is a matter of robbing the east of its water. Is there something that makes central US cities like Moline, St Louis, Dyersburg, Memphis, etc less deserving of access to their water resource?

Rather than building aquaducts on tax-payer dollars to sustain growth of human population in places that cannot naturally sustain it, why not just encourage industry/jobs in places like Duluth, Green Bay, Grand Rapids, Milwaukee, Gary, Detroit, Toledo, Cleavland and Buffalo, Cincinnati, Vicksburg, Nashville etc? People will choose to move to places with jobs and water, and they'll do it on their own dime. That re-colonization will be good for the economy of the Great Lakes region.

Water is the Great Lakes basin's ace-in-the-hole, the people that live within the basin (on both sides of the international border) know it and they are guarding it. Because...just as they say in the southwest...life grows where water flows...and it's pretty clear that as the southwestern US struggles with water shortages, life is going to grow around the Great Lakes.

[yellowcanine]

31. Also begs the question of why California has any right to water from the Great Lakes?

As someone pointed out, the Canadians have something to say about that, not to mention the Great Lakes states. Just because California might be able to afford the cost of such a scheme (extremely doubtful, even if the water itself were "free&quot doesn't mean they would be permitted to take that water.

[Earth_First]

32. Uh, no.

Number 1: The physics just don't work out.

Number 2: I'm not going to support a project that will reward unsustainable development in those regions benefiting most from a pipeline.

Number 3: This steps closer to the debate of 'borrowing' water from the Great Lakes region. Never. In fact it's a "go fuck yourself" position in my book.

[packman]

33. Can be solved with giant sponges

or tilting the nation with huge jacks.

I can't believe that a nation that built a transcontinental RR system, a transcontinental highway system or engineered the changing of rivers courses cannot solve its water problems with mega reservoirs and pipe lines from one part of the country to the other.

Perhaps all those desert golf courses and water-intensive crops need to be reevaluated. I'm such a skeptic, I do know that if there was enough profit in it the problem would be at least taken seriously.

Speaking of water, having above ground water is certainly a concern- BUT , the real issue that should be on every American's mind is the Aquifiers being containimated and drained, especially the High Plain ( Ogallala) one that waters America's wheat growing section in the Mid-west.

[URL=.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]

http://www.classzone.com/books/earth_science/terc/content/investigations/es1406/es1406page10.cfm

[lonestarnot]

35. I'm down with that!

[FarCenter]

39. It is easier to move people than water -- moving the water requires continuous energy

In 1940 there were only 6.9 million people in CA. There is no reason why the population can't be back down to 6.9 million in 60 years.

[bayareaboy]

54. Do you think so...

I'm ready for that scenario.

I can see it now. No more country clubs every mile in the Southland? Perhaps even water meters in Sacramento.

[SoCalNative]

56. We could start

by kicking out all of the non-CA natives. Or if you've been here 60 years or more we might give you a special permit to stay.

[FarCenter]

57. I thought all the CA natives had moved to New Mexico or Montana?

[SoCalNative]

58. Not this one

yet

[Auggie]

43. The West needs effective conservation and more reservoirs

The latter is difficult to justify because reservoirs come at the expense of enviornment.

[Spider Jerusalem]

45. More reservoirs won't do any good

where's the water to fill them going to come from? Lakes Mead and Powell are both below 50% capacity. Longterm projections for the flow of the Colorado River indicate that, best-case, it'll be around 15% below the 20th century average.

[Auggie]

49. Need more reservoirs to retain runoff during wet years

Napa County has its own reservoir -- Lake Hennessy. We're not nearly facing the problems of neighboring Sonoma County.

[LeftyMom]

67. We can only divert and store so much water without destroying inland waterways with salt intrusion.

Some of that water has to go to the sea or some of the best croplands become uselessly salty.

[lunasun]

44. how about move to the water?

Hate to go all Sam Kinison but
will lakes/rivers now be drained for the highest bidder??
Haven't areas in Michigan etc. been in court fighting corps drying up springs and trying to move on to lake areas already
if they can drain water can they dump too if they gain rights

we know something is going to go down with h2o 4awhile
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022473474

[B Calm]

60. They'll have to legalize marijuana for some to move.

Just say'n. .

[lunasun]

61. cottonmouth is not the sole source of drought! no people's pipeline - will be corp run

med MJ in Michigan@ 1yr + already

[Xithras]

63. There is no such thing as "massive excess rain".

Those floodwaters are the only thing keeping the Louisiana bayou from vanishing completely, and are required if we're ever going to restore it. Wanting to divert that water simply makes you another voice calling for environmental destruction in the name of "human progress". Those waters perform critical environmental functions in the southern marshlands, help to flush sediments from the Mississippi river to keep it navigable for commerce, and are important for maintaining salinity levels in the northern Gulf of Mexico (the northern gulf would be considerably saltier without the Mississippi flowing in).

Besides, as others have mentioned, the energy costs would be staggering. To build a pipeline capable of carrying an amount of water equivalent to the Hetch Hetchy aqueduct (small by modern standards, and generally only suitable for drinking water) you would need to lift that water at least 5000 feet. Without even getting into the energy losses to friction, bends in the pipe, inefficiency, etc, you're already talking about 3.75 gigawatts of power to LIFT the water.

If you want to doublecheck my math, I presumed a lift from St.Louis Missouri at 466' in elevation and a path crossing New Mexico, allowing some serious tunnelling to keep the overall elevation gain to only 5000 feet or so. Lifting one acre-foot of water by one foot requires 2,719,226 ft-lbs of energy, so lifting 730 acre/feet (the average daily capacity of the Hetch Hetchy system) by 5000 vertical feet would require 9,925,174,900,000 ft-lbs of force. One horsepower is equal to 33,000 foot pounds per minute so a little bit of math gives us 300,762,876 horse power minutes. Divide that by 60 for hours and we get 5,012,715 horsepower hours. Because 1 horsepower hour = 0.746 KWH, that pencils out to 3,739,485 KW hrs of electricity, or roughly 3.75 gigawatts. That's roughly 3 nuclear power plants worth of electricity. And again, that's JUST FOR THE VERTICAL LIFT, and presumes 100% efficiency for both the pumps and the rest of the transportation process, and assumes zero energy requirements for the horizontal movement of the water.

I don't care HOW "inefficient" desalinization is, it's going to be a hell of a lot more "efficient" that burning 3.75 gigawatts of electricity just to lift a relatively small amount of water over the Continental Divide. Also, keep in mind that 730 acre feet will keep the kitchen taps flowing in Los Angeles, but it isn't going to do a damned thing for the farmers or any other water users, or for any cities other than Los Angeles...that's a lot of power for not very much water.

[Jamastiene]

64. That's actually good thinking, imho.

Too bad the Congress critters won't listen and see water as the valuable thing it is. In the future, water will be hard to find and will be the new resource that we try to protect and conserve. Clean water will be a rarity.

[Kablooie]

66. But if it breaks and floods a sodium plant we'd be in for big trouble.

[LeftyMom]

68. God, I love when people from god knows where tell Californians how to solve our water politics.

90% of the people posting about this on DU couldn't name five California river systems if their very lives depended upon it.

edit: I can't wait until the OP finds out about the continental divide. Or, for that matter, the Sierra Nevada.

[XemaSab]

69. I can name 5 major drainages in my county

Also, the Great Basin might be even more of a thing than teh Sierra.

[LeftyMom]

70. We just need more storage! Then we can store more of the runoff that won't exist!

Hey, you live downhill of a dam on the side of a perfectly serviceable volcano- how much more water can we store uphill from you before you graduate from nervous to pants-shittingly terrified?

[XemaSab]

71. Funny you should ask

They're talking about making the bigass dam even bigger.

Because Westlands.

[LeftyMom]

73. I'm sure the Wintu are delighted.

[XemaSab]

74. I think Caleen Sisk is about to go collect some scalps in Hanford

[Egalitarian Thug]

76. This (adopted) Californian knows that none of the Californians charged with the responsibility for

addressing this venerable problem are ever going to do anything except use their job as a platform for their own payday, so if anything is going to be done, it will come from outside the state.

Colorado. Nevada, Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico have been at war over water for well over a century and California consistent stance has been, 'Fuck you all, we'll take any damned thing we like and you can't do anything about it'.

[NickB79]

79. The day I hear they're building a Great Lakes water pipeline, you can find me at the local gun shop

I'll be picking up a few boxes of steel-core armor piercing rounds for my rifle.

For "target practice".

[B Calm]

80. I think the answer could be in our rising sea levels.

[IDemo]

85. There was a Los Angeles politician a couple of decades ago

Board of Supervisors, if I recall. He was positing that the Snake River nearly a thousand miles north would need to be tapped to supply California's needs because all that water was simply going to waste by emptying into the ocean.

Didn't go over real well.