Things not going well at Yellowstone (flooding)

[Parliament 14333]

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/14/us/yellowstone-national-park-closed-visitors-flooding-tuesday/index.html

 

 

[Orange&White 5539]

Seems like this Country could figure out a way to create a network of pipes/canals, similar to the interstate system, that could move water from areas that are flooding to areas that are in drought. It doesn't seem that it would be cost prohibitive in relation to the value it would bring. Especially since it any given time we have plenty of areas that are in drought and plenty in flood and the costs to mitigate droughts and massive fires is so high.

If we can land shit on the moon, it seems like moving water should be easy.

[Js1 85600]

7 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

Seems like this Country could figure out a way to create a network of pipes/canals, similar to the interstate system, that could move water from areas that are flooding to areas that are in drought. It doesn't seem that it would be cost prohibitive in relation to the value it would bring. Especially since it any given time we have plenty of areas that are in drought and plenty in flood and the costs to mitigate droughts and massive fires is so high.

If we can land shit on the moon, it seems like moving water should be easy.

[Surly Bevo 25169]

Seems like this Country could figure out a way to create a network of pipes/canals, similar to the interstate system, that could move water from areas that are flooding to areas that are in drought. It doesn't seem that it would be cost prohibitive in relation to the value it would bring. Especially since it any given time we have plenty of areas that are in drought and plenty in flood and the costs to mitigate droughts and massive fires is so high.
If we can land shit on the moon, it seems like moving water should be easy.

[Pato del Muerto 52614]

A series of tubes?

[Slacks 6867]

9 minutes ago, Orange&White said:

Seems like this Country could figure out a way to create a network of pipes/canals, similar to the interstate system, that could move water from areas that are flooding to areas that are in drought. It doesn't seem that it would be cost prohibitive in relation to the value it would bring. Especially since it any given time we have plenty of areas that are in drought and plenty in flood and the costs to mitigate droughts and massive fires is so high.

If we can land shit on the moon, it seems like moving water should be easy.

I don't recall Yellowstone being a place that floods. How would this system address flooding there?

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

Just now, Snacks said:

I don't recall Yellowstone being a place that floods. How would this system address flooding there?

let's not get bogged down in the details here, slacks.

[Huckleberry 33109]

1 minute ago, Snacks said:

I don't recall Yellowstone being a place that floods. How would this system address flooding there?

The canals would obviously have to connect every river in the country to every plain to every county that might have a drought. The vast majority would absolutely never be used. This would certainly not result in anyone ever derisively referring to the "canals to nowhere" every single campaign season after the project. No, everyone always supports huge public works projects and never whines about them. 

[Surly Bevo 25169]

The canals would obviously have to connect every river in the country to every plain to every county that might have a drought. The vast majority would absolutely never be used. This would certainly not result in anyone ever derisively referring to the "canals to nowhere" every single campaign season after the project. No, everyone always supports huge public works projects and never whines about them. 

Dont’t forget about the NIMBYs

[Slacks 6867]

3 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

The canals would obviously have to connect every river in the country to every plain to every county that might have a drought. The vast majority would absolutely never be used. This would certainly not result in anyone ever derisively referring to the "canals to nowhere" every single campaign season after the project. No, everyone always supports huge public works projects and never whines about them. 

It would be extremely difficult to do.

Building canals is easy. Telling the water where to go, not so much.

Edited June 14, 2022 by Snacks

[RPM 26359]

Just call John Dutton and get him to blast a new river.

[JesusSweatDuck 17813]

21 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

A series of tubes?

 

[staboner 4988]

flood the large extinction volcano before it kills us all. well done earth.

 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

in general, i do like the idea of taking water from places with lots of water and moving it to places without a lot of water.

let's put elon on it.

[Pato del Muerto 52614]

7 minutes ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

in general, i do like the idea of taking water from places with lots of water and moving it to places without a lot of water.

let's put elon on it.

Would be a twofer if we could take it out of the ocean, as you could combat rising sea levels as you irrigate. 

let Elon work on efficient desalination  

would require some pumping though, as  for some strange reason it seems like most land is uphill from the ocean.

Edited June 14, 2022 by Pato del Muerto

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

Just now, Pato del Muerto said:

Would be a twofer if we could take it out of the ocean, as you could combat rising sea levels as you irrigate. 
 

would require some pumping though, as  for some strange reason it seems like most land is uphill from the ocean.

underwater desalination aqueducts. i like it.

AquaDuckz

[RPM 26359]

14 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

would require some pumping though, as  for some strange reason it seems like most land is uphill from the ocean.

What if we just dig a hole in the bottom of the sea?

 

Edited June 14, 2022 by RPM

[Bevo 13601]

41 minutes ago, Snacks said:

It would be extremely difficult to do.

Building canals is easy. Telling the water where to go, not so much.

I've always wondered what it would cost to desalinate at the coast and push the water to the western Rio Grande.

[Trey3216 15372]

19 minutes ago, RPM said:

What if we just dig a hole in the bottom of the sea?

 

There's a wart on a frog on a knot on a log in a hole in the bottom of the sea.  

[Brisketexan 105425]

11 minutes ago, Bevo said:

I've always wondered what it would cost to desalinate at the coast and push the water to the western Rio Grande.

Imagine a metric shitton of money.

Then quintuple it.  At that point, you would have the down payment just to conduct the initial feasibility studies for such a project.

Desalination is expensive.  Giant-ass pipelines are SUPER expensive.  Pumps are expensive.  Pumping is expensive.

[Orange&White 5539]

1 hour ago, Huckleberry said:

The canals would obviously have to connect every river in the country to every plain to every county that might have a drought. The vast majority would absolutely never be used. This would certainly not result in anyone ever derisively referring to the "canals to nowhere" every single campaign season after the project. No, everyone always supports huge public works projects and never whines about them. 

You don't have to connect every river to every river. Just connections between basins.

1 hour ago, Surly Bevo said:

Dont’t forget about the NIMBYs

That is the biggest obstacle. Well...them and the water rights lawyers.

 

43 minutes ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

in general, i do like the idea of taking water from places with lots of water and moving it to places without a lot of water.

 

IKR??

39 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

Would be a twofer if we could take it out of the ocean, as you could combat rising sea levels as you irrigate. 
 

would require some pumping though, as  for some strange reason it seems like most land is uphill from the ocean.

While it is true that most land is uphill from the ocean, the areas of this country that get more rain are typically uphill from the places that don't get enough water.

Edited June 14, 2022 by Orange&White

[JBJ 3666]

58 minutes ago, Snacks said:

It would be extremely difficult to do.

Building canals is easy. Telling the water where to go, not so much.

Especially in the mountains.

Flooding is also extremely common up there.  It's a region of land with mountains surrounding large flat valleys that are essentially seasonal flood plains when the snow melts, which isn't in the same pattern every year. I frequented Yellowstone as a kid, and it was common for trails to be closed due to flooding or to have to turn back because you found yourself looking at foot-deep water for the foreseeable future.

The only thing uncommon about this is that it's preventing park access wholesale.

Edited June 14, 2022 by JBJ

[phdhorn 6224]

1) The Yellowstone is an undammed, 600-mile river - it floods, you just don't hear about it. 
2) Any transference of water will be expensive, but maybe not so much as believed.  Pipes could easily use gravity to allow the water to go thousands of miles on each side of the continental divide if funneling from the mountains.  Once it got to substations it could be pumped.  Since about 90% of the water would be needed for the Great Plains and West, gravity could do a lot of work to move the water.   Oil pipelines (with regular pumping stations, since oil is thicker and more resistant to gravity) exist all over the country, water could theoretically happen.  Especially as the distances might not be all that great. But the problem would be to establish reservoirs "up there" with land rights, etc. as well as rights-of-way to destinations.  But geographically, it's very possible, actually (if you draw the water from higher elevations).
3) Desalinization costs aren't what they used to be due to improvements in osmosis technology, but they're not dirt cheap.  It costs money and energy to pressurize the water through filters, as most desaliniztion would be "uphill" as the seas are lower than the land (duh!).  Even if you simply pump unfiltered saltwater "up" then use gravity by building "downhill" osmosis plants, it still requires a good amt. of energy/electricity/etc. to move that water through filters.  California has a few more local plants, esp. around San Diego.  But California just last month rejected a large-scale desalinization plan for one reason mostly - the enormous amount of salt and particulates filtered are a problem.  To just release them back into the ocean would likely result in "dead spots" which would kill off life in locales where the salt is dumped.  That needs to be solved to be feasible.  But I would think they'll figure it out eventually.

There is going to come a time where water transfer will be vital for say everyone living south and west of the lower Mississippi.  Just too many people have moved there to sustain water usage (including Austin) so they'll have to do something.  A national (or semi-national) network of pipelines is the most likely answer at some point.

[Orange&White 5539]

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/21/climate/rain-drought-pipeline.html

 

[Guest]

13 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Imagine a metric shitton of money.

Then quintuple it.  At that point, you would have the down payment just to conduct the initial feasibility studies for such a project.

Desalination is expensive.  Giant-ass pipelines are SUPER expensive.  Pumps are expensive.  Pumping is expensive.

we could harness the wind...

[CHIEF 5095]

Just dehydrate the water, make it into tiny pills. Drive the pills to the drought location throw out a few pills and a few drops of water on them, and "poof" you've made enough water to fill up every lake between Buchanan and Lady Bird. Easy, peasy.

CHIEF

[Brisketexan 105425]

4 minutes ago, slorch said:

we could harness the wind...

There are some energy "solutions" that can help defray costs of the desal, and even some of the pumping, with clean energy.

Giant-ass pipelines are a whole nother deal.  For the distances and scales we'd be talking about, a shitload of billions, stacked on top of each other.  There's a reason we haven't built large-scale water moving projects in the US -- every other option, even if expensive, is still a lot cheaper.

I have worked with and hunt with an old water guy, and he has a great expression -- "water is free.  It falls from the sky.  It's the catching it and moving it to where you want it to be that costs you out the ass."

[Bevo 13601]

5 minutes ago, slorch said:

we could harness the wind...

I would think once you get to the desert, you could desalinate mainly through evaporation. I wouldn't know how to capture the water, though.

[Brisketexan 105425]

7 minutes ago, Bevo said:

I would think once you get to the desert, you could desalinate mainly through evaporation. I wouldn't know how to capture the water, though.

A solar evaporation (distillation) plant to sufficient scale would be.......enormous.  Just doing a quick look, and it looks like a solar distillation plant (when the sun is doing its job -- even in the desert, you get clouds and precip sometimes, and the efficiency of the sun changes seasonally) will  yield about 6000 gallons per acre per day.  The average household uses around 300 gallons per day, so you need an acre of land to meet the needs of 20 houses, as well as the collection infrastructure, and delivery to where the people are.  And that's not even accounting for what you do with the leftover salts that have to be disposed of somehow.  There's a reason that distillation is a water option mostly for isolated communities with few other options.

Edited June 14, 2022 by Brisketexan

[Steel Shank 9432]

Imagine a metric shitton of money.
Then quintuple it.  At that point, you would have the down payment just to conduct the initial feasibility studies for such a project.
Desalination is expensive.  Giant-ass pipelines are SUPER expensive.  Pumps are expensive.  Pumping is expensive.

If we only had a world class pipe laying specialist around.

[Pato del Muerto 52614]

Throw the salts onto bonneville. 

[Pato del Muerto 52614]

1 minute ago, Steel Shank said:

If we only had a world class pipe laying specialist around.

This isn’t a narrow gauge project

[Brisketexan 105425]

2 minutes ago, Steel Shank said:

If we only had a world class pipe laying specialist around.

 

Just now, Pato del Muerto said:

This isn’t a narrow gauge project

And.....Pato just beat me to the punch.

[Armybrat 40920]

1 hour ago, Pato del Muerto said:

A series of tubes?

Paging Steel Shank….

[Guest]

My wind comment was rooted much more in the Texas Freeze up and was not submitted as a practical solution.

[Armybrat 40920]

Channel the aggy tears up to the Llano Estacado & Permian Basin after UT joins the SEC.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Armybrat said:

Channel the aggy tears up to the Llano Estacado & Permian Basin after UT joins the SEC.

too salty, damn you.

Edited June 14, 2022 by slorch

[JBJ 3666]

21 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

A solar evaporation (distillation) plant to sufficient scale would be.......enormous.  Just doing a quick look, and it looks like a solar distillation plant (when the sun is doing its job -- even in the desert, you get clouds and precip sometimes, and the efficiency of the sun changes seasonally) will  yield about 6000 gallons per acre per day.  The average household uses around 300 gallons per day, so you need an acre of land to meet the needs of 20 houses, as well as the collection infrastructure, and delivery to where the people are.  And that's not even accounting for what you do with the leftover salts that have to be disposed of somehow.  There's a reason that distillation is a water option mostly for isolated communities with few other options.

Wouldn't the salt be worth more than the water?

Edited June 14, 2022 by JBJ

[Armybrat 40920]

8 minutes ago, slorch said:

too salty, damn you.

Aggy ain’t salty at all.

[Wally Fairway 5588]

2 hours ago, Orange&White said:

Seems like this Country could figure out a way to create a network of pipes/canals, similar to the interstate system, that could move water from areas that are flooding to areas that are in drought. It doesn't seem that it would be cost prohibitive in relation to the value it would bring. Especially since it any given time we have plenty of areas that are in drought and plenty in flood and the costs to mitigate droughts and massive fires is so high.

If we can land shit on the moon, it seems like moving water should be easy.

speaking for the Great Lakes region - fuck off, and don't siphon off OUR water.
we (Michigan) already have to share with the likes of Illinois, Ohio and other minor players

[Kel Varnsen 8542]

Sounds like a project for Kramerica Industries.

[bolverk 29728]

Each color gradation is 1 inch plus or minus in average annual rainfall over the last 30 years. Much of the West and Southwest are fucked, especially as it gets hotter and results in higher rates of evaporation.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/08/24/climate/warmer-wetter-world.html

[Brisketexan 105425]

18 minutes ago, JBJ said:

Wouldn't the salt be worth more than the water?

As I understand, it doesn't exactly leave behind a container of Morton's table salt.  It leaves a condensed brine solution, which would require further energy to distill down to zero water, all salt.  In fact, disposing of the brine is one of the big problems/challenges.  Maybe you could spread it out in giant salt pans to complete the evaporation process, I dunno.  Again, it's all about cost, and what you get in return.  There's a reason that desalination is not a favored water source.

[SquishMitten 10443]

How bout a big water wheel in the ocean that dumps water into a gondola system. You could leave them uncovered so you get evaporation the entire way. Run them along power line routes anywhere possible so you don’t have to deal with as many land rights. Let Morton’s pay for the project, and in exchange, they get all the salt. Easy peasy

[Brisketexan 105425]

3 minutes ago, SquishMitten said:

How bout a big water wheel in the ocean that dumps water into a gondola system. You could leave them uncovered so you get evaporation the entire way. Run them along power line routes anywhere possible so you don’t have to deal with as many land rights. Let Morton’s pay for the project, and in exchange, they get all the salt. Easy peasy

[crash_davis 23115]

2 hours ago, Surly Bevo said:

Pont du Gard in Provence. That picture does not do justice to the scale of that build and engineering involved to build that aqueduct. That thing is massive. Just beyond that right side of that pic is a tunnel they built through a mountain/hill for the aqueduct. Kayaking and paddle boarding that river and floating beneath that 2000+ year old structure is memorable. Jumping off the cliffs is even better.

[52-80 19262]

wouldn't global warming and the destruction of the ozone increase evaporation and allow the source of this flooding to escape beyond the exosphere?

sounds like a self-solving problem to me.

[tbone_ 14179]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Arizona_Project

Central Arizona Project. I believe I have heard or read that this was the largest federal public works project since the Hoover Dam at the time.

[TexasEd 8077]

1 hour ago, bolverk said:

Each color gradation is 1 inch plus or minus in average annual rainfall over the last 30 years. Much of the West and Southwest are fucked, especially as it gets hotter and results in higher rates of evaporation.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/08/24/climate/warmer-wetter-world.html

Looking for the biggest ROI.  That map plus this one:

 

Shows that you probably have to get water from the Mississippi basin around Iowa over to the Colorado River Basin west of Denver.  You could possibly take some from the Missouri River basin near Omaha as well. 

So a pipeline from Iowa through Nebraska and then West of Denver could help the Nevada and SoCal water needs.

[Orange&White 5539]

42 minutes ago, TexasEd said:

Looking for the biggest ROI.  That map plus this one:

 

Shows that you probably have to get water from the Mississippi basin around Iowa over to the Colorado River Basin west of Denver.  You could possibly take some from the Missouri River basin near Omaha as well. 

So a pipeline from Iowa through Nebraska and then West of Denver could help the Nevada and SoCal water needs.

Couldn't you just pump from Oregon down to SoCal?