4 ways we can avoid a catastrophic drought | David Sedlak

As the world's climate patterns continue to shift unpredictably, places where drinking water was once abundant may soon find reservoirs dry and groundwater aquifers depleted. In this talk, civil and environmental engineer David Sedlak shares four practical solutions to the ongoing urban water crisis. His goal: to shift our water supply towards new, local sources of water and create a system that is capable of withstanding any of the challenges climate change may throw at us in the coming years.

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[srimansrini]

In this candid talk, David Sedlak gives some pragmatic ideas for how to replenish our water resources. The climate change is causing doom all around the world. This is the right time to discuss the subject like this. I hope the politicians, policy makers and people who are associated with the 'water resource management' will take note of this kind of ideas to stabilise the woefully disturbing 'climate change.'

[alexplorer]

He doesn't devote nearly enough time to gray water systems under the "Water Reuse" section. You can create very low-tech systems that simply return most of the water in your home to the ground to replenish aquifers. Specifically:
---All my laundry water goes to my lawn. Soap doesn't hurt it (I use liquid detergent; powdered detergent contains sodium, so don't use that).
---Additionally, I flush the toilets with recycled bath water.
---Excess bath water also goes out with the laundry water into the lawn.
---I've never calculated the water saved from toilet flushes, but it's 1.5 gal per flush, so conservatively I'd say 1.5 x 2/day x 365 = About 1100 gallons per year.
---I did keep track of laundry. My machine uses 26 gal/load * 349 loads = More than 9000 gallons last year.
---If everyone on my block did the same, we'd be talking about millions of gallons of water saved or reclaimed.

[longjohnsilver]

How about this for an idea, don't build mega cities in the dessert.

[kaielvin]

Why is he putting so much effort into avoiding to mention Singapore ? I have heard about the exact same talk from Singapore authorities, except that they talked in the past tense, because the whole system is already in place. This is a case worth mentioning if you're trying to convince a crowd about a solution.

[RinoaL]

5:56 actually the water that comes off your roof is ussually pretty clean, i wouldnt mind drinking it. just make sure your gutters are clean and whatnot.

[slowpoke]

Ever here of the 'dust boul" or here in Canada they called it the dirty 30's. It was a much greater state of 'climate change' then we are facing now. The US government had the largest tree planting program in history. The planted 250 million trees, in a few years the water come back. You want water, plant trees. They don't call them rain forest for no reason!

[brooksanderson]

Excellent! Now (2021) we are 5+ years on in what some scientists have called a "Megadrought" in Western USA. . I wonder how many and to what extent, in real nuumbers, have these measures have been implimented? old geologist

[Cryptonymicus]

Amazing how many geniuses and experts who have all the answers posting comments here.

[mpking-eyys]

Singapore has put all of these ideas in good use since 10 years ago. Why is this guy talking like he has got some brilliant ideas?

[FredoLua]

The downside of lake mead is that the Colorado River doesn't make it to the Gulf. Displacement of the Yaqui area was massive. Also, the environmental damage in South Arizona through Sonora is a big deal!

[SeanLumly]

How to avoid a catastrophic drought? Easy: *Stop eating meat.*

A large portion of this potable water is being fed to livestock directly and to the feed that the livestock will consume. Animal agriculture is also the causing desertification and deforestation which likely affects rainfall as vegetation and rainfall are tightly correlated.

A low estimate states that a single pound of beef requires 600 gallons of water to produce! That's enough for 25 days of 10-minute showers (2.5gallon/min)! This has been estimated to be the 3-day consumption of an average meat-eater in the US.

[Sharmika_]

It's good idea to protect droughts

[pacoo]

Why can't we use the extreme pressures deep in the ocean to power the reverse osmosis system? Say you run a pipe down to the ocean debts that has a tank at the bottom with walls lined in a fine, semi-permeable membrane. At the surface you can have a large container or ship that holds the fresh water. As long as you keep pulling filtered water out, the deep water pressure will keep forcing water though the membrane<the membrane being at the bottom of the pipe>
It'll be like oil drilling but the the water pumps itself. The pressure depends on the level of fresh water at the surface of the pipe/container . So a ship can just pump the fresh water into it's hull or into a large bag floating in the ocean and ship it and the deep sea pressure will just force more water into the pipe to replace the water that was removed.
Even more, you can run this pipe to the shore and have it pumped onto the land and collected in reservoirs.
I don't see what could be wrong with this idea, anyone think otherwise? Please comment.

[Gee]

I would like to see one catastrophic drought so we can start to give the resource the respect it deserves.

[dattebenforcer]

Wow, a TED talk, nay, a TEDx talk that's actually about a real topic? And whose presentation isn't mired with personal story or anecdote? What is happening here?

[keeper]

Next on Ted Talks: How to Stop The Government or Military from creating psyop's and fake news to make law changes.
Next on Ted Ta;lks: How to approach people that are clueless about information they need to know, without calling them asleep or sheeple.
Next on Ted Talks: How to handle approaching a drug addict and how to show them they need to get help and how to get them that help.
Next on Ted Talks: How to make Ted Talks more important to the current real life problems people are currently facing.

[matskjr]

13.37 long, now thats the interesting part

[Stabacs]

hmm, I don't know about the details but I think that the first two ideas are used in germany for 50 years or so?

[shaqpac]

Hello people, I'm looking for a specific ted talk video in which the speaker does a biography about Muhammad Ali. I know its on this channel but i cant find the speaker or the video. Thanks for the help.

[lyndawilliams]

How bout stop deforestation, mono cultures, fracking, and start trying to keep the water ON the land, with keyline berms etc. The answers are there, you just cant get past big business. Use permaculture. Ahh but that would upset monsanto and the fertiliser people..