Hydrogen oxide, hydrogen monoxide, hydrogen hydroxide, dihydrogen oxide, hydroxic acid, hydric acid and hydrohydroxic acid, are scientific nomenclature for what is commonly known as water. Water, as anyone who has gone without a drink for a number of hours on a hot day can attest, is essential to life.
This most vital of all substances, to a Canadian, it is taken for granted on a scale most of the earth’s population can only puzzle over. With our nation’s relative abundance, at some 20 per cent of the world’s fresh water supply, our insouciance is easy to understand. Our small population contributes to a relatively low demand on this resource. The rest of the world is not so lucky.
Our nearest neighbour and potential aggressor, should need ever reach desperate proportion, shares a serious depletion problem with countries in arid climates. In particular a type of ground water referred to as fossil water or paleowater, named for its ancient origins, is instigating increasing concern.
The Ogallala aquifer, part of the High Plains aquifer of the central United States has dropped by 100 feet in some areas and saturated thickness has been reduced by half in others.
What makes fossil aquifers so significant is recharging, which is so unlikely as to class them a non-renewable resource.
Coastal areas are hardest hit, the inhabitants surrounding the world’s oceans draw hard on fresh water and as a result costal aquifers are becoming brackish and undrinkable. The threat grows with each passing year as water supplies shrink and populations increase.
Although sea water covers some 71 per cent of the planet’s surface and contains 97 per cent of all waters, it is unusable for terrestrial life. Historically, evaporation and subsequent rainfall purify and replenishing the fresh water supply, presently this means is critically inadequate. With ground water reservoirs so severely threatened, science has undertaken to examine sea water utilization.
Standard desalination plants generally use a reverse osmosis process to render saltwater drinkable. This technique requires expensive, low production membranes that require regular maintenance and large energy supplies.
Enter the MOF, or metal-organic framework. These materials have an internal surface area unrivalled by any currently known substance. Scientists at Australia’s Monash University, CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation), and the University of Texas at Austin, have collaborated to develop the “ion Selectivity” of biological cell membranes into a filter that allows for a discriminating and efficient method of desalination.
The efficacy of a MOF in desalination is just one of its attributes; the membranes inherent selectivity allows for ions to be specifically targeted. A major attribute of this process is in that lithium can be harvested from the seawater as it is desalinated.
As lithium is a major component in the batteries that power almost every modern convenience imaginable, mining the element is lucrative. Obviously a dividend to offset the operational costs of maintaining the large water plants so desperately required.
Technology has the capacity to serve mankind, is humanity cognizant enough to recognize its benefits before thirst kills us off?
Lorne Oja can be reached at lorne@solartechnical.ca