Category Archives: Green Water

Akash Ganga – Water from thin air

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Arun Natarajan points to the profile of S. Sivakumar, founder of Akash Ganga in The Mint.

All his life, Sivakumar, who looks an unlikely capitalist in his casual trousers, shirt, and bushy white moustache, has been interested in understanding what makes some people rich, and others poor.

At the Delhi School of Economics, where he completed his doctorate, his thesis was on this subject. He studied 200 families across three generations in rural India. His conclusion: “Affluence is a matter of chance.”

That discovery changed his political viewpoint…His interest in understanding the genesis of wealth did not…he was convinced that water, or the absence of it, held the key.

The idea for Akash Ganga came to Sivakumar in 2004, mainly as an offshoot of his research…The scientific basis behind Sivakumar’s air-to-water conversion is the heat exchange process: In this case, it involves sucking in air from the atmosphere and blowing it over cold gas resulting in the creation of water (in much the same way, condensate, or water, forms on the outside of the windows of a heated room in winter or an air-conditioned room in summer).

To Sivakumar, Akash Ganga, named after the tributary of the Ganga that provides water to the heavens in Hindu mythology, is more than a company; it is a mission. “I am doing this under a business format because there is no other format to take it to the people,” he says.
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By mid-2004, Sivakumar and his team worked out how to make water from air. AGL invested in a modest 3,000 sq. ft manufacturing facility and started rolling out its products. Priced between Rs9,200 (USD 235) (for an 8-litre version) to Rs42,500 (USD 1,087) (for a 120-litre one), the machines were powered by electricity, and sold through stores that sold consumer durables such as television sets, washing machines and refrigerators. The Akash Ganga machines produced a litre of water at an average cost of Rs0.80 a litre (USD 0.02c), but, surprisingly, found little success. The company was unable to sell the product as it lacked the resources to market the product on a larger scale.
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Since the process of converting air to water results in a drop in temperature (one reason why some air conditioners leak water), AGI has pitched its products as a three-in-one as the company terms it: an airconditioner, water creator, and air cleanser.

The machine produces ISO standard water for drinking and the company has sold some 400 machines till now. Considering fresh water is a major decreasing resource in the entire world and particularly in India, this innovation has some good potential if the economics work out.

Global Water Tool

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Water will become an increasingly important resource to understand and manage for businesses to perform.

Joel Makower writes about a new tool to help global businesses manage their water risks.

World Water Week is upon us, an annual fete of all things H2O. The event, held in Stockholm, is the leading global meeting place for experts from businesses, governments, science, NGOs, academe and United Nations agencies. This year’s event features the launch on Tuesday of a remarkable Global Water Tool, a free online resource to help companies calculate water consumption and efficiency across a portfolio of facilities around the world.

The tool is the product of the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, a Geneva-based organization of some 200 international companies representing 30 countries and 20 industrial sectors. Nearly all of its members have core businesses that depend heavily on water: Alcan (Charts) and Alcoa (Charts, Fortune 500) (aluminum production), ConocoPhillips (Charts, Fortune 500) and Shell (Charts) (oil production and refining), Dow (Charts, Fortune 500) and Dupont (Charts, Fortune 500) (chemicals and ag products), Rio Tinto (mining), Lafarge and Holcim (cement), Pepsico and Suez (water and beverages)

Indeed, pretty much all large companies depend heavily on water.

One of the challenges such companies face is assessing the potential risks posed by water’s uneven quality and quantity from place to place, and even from time to time in the same place. For companies, the questions are many: How many sites are in extremely water-scarce areas? Which sites are at greatest risk? How that will change in the future? How many employees live in countries that lack access to improved water and sanitation? How many suppliers are in water-scarce areas now, or will be in ten or twenty years?

Pay or Pray

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Every day in the newspapers and TV shows you see the lamenting on water shortages. In a country of only 22 million people there is an increasing water shortage. How can this be possible?

The Age reports on the two possibilities:

NOT enough water? There are only two alternatives. One is to pray for rain. The other is to pay more.

According to Paul Butler, the managing director of the British water company South East Water, customers, including business, will have to start getting used to the latter. And it could be a lot more expensive.

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“I think everybody out there is recognising there is something out there called climate change. And certainly, when we make our water resource plans, we make an allowance for climate change going forward. What it in effect does is put in place an amount of hedge room. It has to be met.”

Apart from the need to adapt for growing climate change issues, what is important is to put in place the infrastructure to create enough water.

The Murray-Darling plan hopes to cut down on the inefficient farmers however, in the long run desalination plants and recycled systems should be the way to go. If Dubai in a desert does not have water problems, Australia should not.

At the end it all comes down to costs and revenue. With a marginal cost of $1.16 for a kiloliter (1000 liters) of water in South Australia, it is a far cry from the $2.5 to $3 we pay for 600ml of bottled water. If we get ready to Pay more for water (nearing its real cost) then more water will be available, conservation will be possible and Australia can go back to living like the developed country that it is.

Climate change and War

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Reading the news that US Army generals are urging US President George W Bush to cut down greenhouse gases seem too extreme. However, I think their argument may have some merit.

It warns that over the next 30 to 40 years, there will be conflicts over water resources, as well as increased instability resulting from rising sea levels and global warming-related refugees.

“The chaos that results can be an incubator of civil strife, genocide and the growth of terrorism,” the 35-page report predicts.

Writing in the report, Gen Zinni, a former commander of US Central Command, says: “It’s not hard to make the connection between climate change and instability, or climate change and terrorism.”

Their timing of 30 years could be too early, but there could be conflicts if not war over natural resources including Water.

CSIRO Solve – February 2007

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The Solve quarterly magazine from  CSIRO has many sustainability related articles (Feb 2007 edition). The theme is the intersection of technology, science, multi-disciplinary collaboration and partnerships to create a sustainable world.

Water and IT

The Water theme is continuing on Worldisgreen.com and this time the problem is of data.

The first step in solving the water problem is getting the data on how much water is available, how much is used now and what may be available in the future. In order to achieve this, information technology may be the answer.

A Water Resources Observation Network (WRON) was instigated by CSIRO’s Dr Rob Vertessy in response to the clear need for more accurate monitoring of Australia’s water resources.

He says billions of dollars of investment are needed in new water-supply infrastructure as the urban population grows and the long-term effects of climate change become more apparent. “But where do we start? Good water information is the key to answering these questions.”

The problems being solved revolve around defining data standards, developing security solutions, managing historical data, and even created web-robots to gather dam-level data from multiple web sources.

I can appreciate the need to develop data standards and the ability to transfer data among many different organizations. My current work has been delayed by many months due to the lack of consistent data standards and unavailability of open standards like XML.

Click the link below for the rest of the post.

Continue reading →

Biofuels Will Make China, India More Thirsty

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Andy Mukherjee, a good opinion writer for Bloomberg, writes about the increasing interest in China and India for Bio-fuels. The consequence of this will be the impact on food due to the scarcity of water.

If water were a globally traded commodity, with unmet demand in China and India reflected in its price, the world might shed its newfound craze for biofuels. Growing corn to make ethanol to run sport-utility vehicles is downright silly; nowhere more so than in China and India.Water

As many as 400 Chinese cities are facing water shortages; farmers in the most-populous nation are forgoing millions of tons of grain production every year. Per-capita availability of water is expected to shrink to alarming levels by 2030.

Amid this water scarcity, China has gone on to become the world’s third-largest bio-ethanol producer after Brazil and the U.S., pouring thousands of gallons of water to grow a ton of corn, and then using more water to turn the corn into ethanol.

The tradeoff between water and biofuels may also be crucial for India. One-sixth of India’s food output is being supported by pumping groundwater, which is depleting rapidly. In the state of Tamil Nadu, more than a third of aquifers are “overexploited,” meaning the rate at which water is being extracted is more than the pace of recharge. According to the World Bank’s estimates, by 2050 demand for water in India will exceed all available supplies.

“If water would have its correct price, then we wouldn’t even be thinking about biofuels,” Nestle SA Chief Executive Officer Peter Brabeck-Letmathe said last month at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “If I had to identify one resource I’m worried about, that’s water.”

Water is emerging as the main issue all around the world. At Worldisgreen.com, we have been writing about this issue for sometime now.

Greenpeace suggested that the growing need for bio-fuels are fuelling the growth for deforestation in Indonesia.’

In Food or Fuel, Lester Brown comments that “By the end of 2007, the emerging competition between the 800 million automobile owners who want to maintain their mobility and the world’s 2 billion poorest people who want simply to survive will be on center stage.”

And Larry West from About.com says, The most valuable commodity in the world today, and likely to remain so for much of this century, is not oil, not natural gas, not even some type of renewable energy. It’s water—clean, safe, fresh water.

The current Water debate in Australia is clearly shows the need for leadership in this area.

And Water is Wealth. A UNEP Finance Initiate called water “an emerging risk of strategic importance to businesses and their financial backers around the world.”

Economics teaches the opportunity cost of goods and services. This is the basic principle to understand in this march towards alternative fuels.

Atanu Dey explains the importance of opportunity costs:

In fact, I would go so far as to claim that economics at its most fundamental is the careful systematic study of opportunity costs. Opportunity costs implies choices and tradeoffs, and is itself the consequence of a fundamental physical characteristic of the universe that we live in. That fundamental fact is that this universe has limits. Each one of us has a limited amount of time and other derivative resources at our disposal.

Understanding this core principle is important in deciding upon alternatives, making choices and taking policy and strategic decisions.

Recycled water in Australia

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Recycled water is being used in many parts of the world to solve the water crisis. The drought in Australia is taking its toll and Peter Beatie, the Premier of Queensland, with low-level of water in the dams is going ahead with a program to pump in recycled sewage water into the dams.

Water

He says: “These are ugly decisions … but you either drink water or you die … There’s no choice … It’s liquid gold … it’s a matter of life and death”

Australian state governments have been wary of providing recycled water to its people and are suggesting other measures like taking smaller showers. With only 20 million people living on one large continent, even if it is the driest in the world, Australia should not have a water problem. The present water crisis should have been expected a prepared for.

Should Australia waste this water:

Each year, Australia’s major cities draw more than 2200 billion litres of water from rivers and ground water sources for industrial, commercial and domestic uses, before expelling 1300 billion litres of it into the sea or rivers. With a drying climate reducing water availability and a growing population increasing demand for water, it raises the question – do we really need to waste this water?

With desalination technology available, recycled water system which can be implemented and water bills the least of all expenses for a household, Australia should not be worrying about this liquid gold. In fact, when Australian’s are ready to pay $2.5 for bottled water and creating a environmental problem, they should be ready to pay for household water a little more than the current price.

A key cause of the urban “water shortage” is that artificially low prices for water have made alternative sources – including piping water from rural areas to the cities, better use of stormwater run-off and fixing leaking pipes, recycling and desalination – uneconomic.

“Most water experts agree that by the time current water prices are increased by 50 per cent to 100 per cent [from their current 41 cents to $1.50 per kilolitre] a range of new supply options become economically viable,” the Business Council paper says.

Simple economics, complex politics. However, as the Crikey‘s editor wrote today about Peter Beattie,

“The Queensland government’s decision to abandon its referendum on recycling drinking water from treated sewage – because the water shortage is too acute and there’s no time to waste – will probably be cited as an example of government autocracy or even dumb politics.

It is neither. Rather, it’s an example of what governments are supposed to do – govern. Be decisive in the interests of the electorate. Accept the mandate and exercise it.”

Australia needs leadership in this area.

Water and Wealth

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Nature provides many resources and services for human beings. Air, Water and Land are the three most common. Air is generally better understood as it is seen everyday and pollution in cities have a direct effect on the people living there.

Water is under appreciated. Water is a major source of wealth to human kind. We, as a species, have had a great history with water. Agriculture is made possible due to the abundant use of water. Great cities have been built around the world on the banks of rivers. These are the prominent ones. There are others which are “behind the scene” like wetlands.

The World Wild Life fund recently suggested that the annual global value of wetlands stood at $70 billion through functions such as flood control, recreational fishing, amenity and recreation and water filtration.

For example, look at this graphic from Rich Countries, Poor Water from WWF.

In Adelaide, Australia (where I live) new Level 3 Water Restrictions are in place from Jan 1st of this year to combat the low water availability in the state. This is true to most of Australia.

These type of restrictions rock the daily life of people and decrease the quality of living standards.

Coming from India with a much larger population than Australia I was surprised to see the water restrictions which started in 2006 across Australia. Yes, Australia is the driest continent on Earth, but still it does not answer why it cannot provide water to its 20 million residents. Adelaide has a small population of 1 million.

A report in August, 2006 by WWF on Water and Developed Countries highlights the issue in developed countries across the world.

Water crises, long seen as a problem of only the poorest, are increasingly affecting some of the world’s wealthiest nations, warns WWF. The report shows that a combination of climate change and drought and loss of wetlands that store water, along with poorly thought out water infrastructure and resource mismanagement, is making this crisis truly global. The report highlights impacts of water problems in countries such as Australia, Spain, Japan, and the UK, and the US.

“The crisis in rich nations is proof that wealth and infrastructure are no insurance against scarcity, pollution, climate change and drought,” adds Pittock. “They are clearly no substitute for protecting rivers and wetlands, and restoring floodplain areas.”

As the report suggets, it does seem likely that a major part of the problem is bad management of natural resources and lack of planning.

Water for Adelaide and a large part of Australian population comes from the Murray-Darling river basin.

It’s what the Nile is to ancient Egypt, the Tigris and Euphrates is to the Babylonians. This is where the Australians first learned to till and irrigate the land and where Sheep were first grazed.

A vast expanse of plains and mountains stretching for 3,000km from the river’s source high upon the highlands of NSW and into south Queensland, to its mouth in South Australia it drains the continent of excess rain water.

Along the river’s banks two thirds of Australia’s crops are grown. The vast plains that are irrigated by its muddy waters produce most of Australia’s fruit and vegetables, much of its maize and even some of its rice.

For more than 200 days of the year this once mighty river no longer makes it to the sea.
It’s like the Rhine petering out in central Germany, or the Nile drying up in northern Sudan.

Why? In large part humans are to blame, in particular Australia’s governments, who have long believed nature should be bent to man’s will. The river has been overused and abused. Dozens of dams block its flow, drawing off huge quantities of water to grow cotton in the desert. Cotton not for home industries, but for export raw, to flood saturated markets, a business no one profits from.

Governments have huge responsibility and power in the management of water resources. People and businesses, need and depend on water for their ability to survive and thrive in this world.

Joel Makower writes about the increasing concern for business on water scarcity.

The connections between the business world and the world’s water supply have gained increased attention lately…The world’s freshwater supply is at risk and the question is when and where, not whether, there will be major droughts or shortages that could have a major disruptive effect on business and society.

In the business world, companies in both developed and developing countries should expect to find water issues rising to the level of awareness that energy conservation and efficiency has seen in recent years. Business needs reliable water supplies to manufacture products and deliver services to its customers. It also needs safe sanitation systems to protect the health of its employees and to treat and recycle used water. Without these things, few companies can operate.

A UNEP Finance Initiate called water “an emerging risk of strategic importance to businesses and their financial backers around the world.”

From Chip manufactures to Cola makers every company across the world needs to look at the way water is being used in their operations and the best way to develop a sustainable cycle of water use.

Success depends on it.

Choice: Food or Fuel / Oil or Water

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As mentioned in the previous post, should the Tata group in India produce cars at a cheaper cost to enable transportation by car for many Indians or not develop as cars are the major problem in environmental degradation?

Darryl D’Monte writing in InfoChange India on WorldWatch’s new Vital Signs report comments on the lack of focus on the looming water problems in the world and concentrating the hot issue of oil.

If one wanted to pose the problem with such US-based think-tanks and their worldviews, one could ask the question: Which is more important, the shortage of oil or the shortage of water?

If one takes food itself, there is a serious underlying water dimension, as most grain-growing countries spend 70% and more of their water resources on irrigation. Only recently, the Earth Policy Institute, run by Worldwatch founder Lester Brown, reported: “Together, China, India and the United States produce nearly half the world’s grain, and these three countries plus Pakistan collectively account for over three-fourths of the world’s reported groundwater extraction for agricultural purposes.”

This shows the dramatically different needs of the developed and the developing world. Each have different environmental concerns. A NGO based in Washington targeting a large western population concentrates more on oil problems than water or sanitation.

In the same article, he connects to the issue of Food or Fuel from Lester Brown. Brown writes “Supermarkets and Service Stations Now Competing for Grain”

Cars, not people, will claim most of the increase in world grain consumption this year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture projects that world grain use will grow by 20 million tons in 2006. Of this, 14 million tons will be used to produce fuel for cars in the United States, leaving only 6 million tons to satisfy the world’s growing food needs.

With so many distilleries being built, livestock and poultry producers fear there may not be enough corn to produce meat, milk, and eggs. And since the United States supplies 70 percent of world corn exports, corn-importing countries are worried about their supply.

As the price of oil climbs, it becomes increasingly profitable to convert farm commodities into automotive fuel, either ethanol or biodiesel. In effect, the price of oil becomes the support price for food commodities. Whenever the food value of a commodity drops below its fuel value, the market will convert it into fuel.

This was a startling fact for me. The world markets are more inter-connected than ever before. Bio-fuels are better than oil, but if they increase the price of food grains it will effect 2 billion poorest people in the world, many of whom spend half or more of their income on food, rising grain prices can quickly become life threatening.

There are no easy answers to this paradox of choice. Food or Fuel?

Brown writes in a subsequent Eco-Economy update.

By the end of 2007, the emerging competition between the 800 million automobile owners who want to maintain their mobility and the world’s 2 billion poorest people who want simply to survive will be on center stage.

The attempt to solve one problem—growing U.S. dependence on imported oil—is creating another far more serious problem. Fortunately this can be avoided. The 3 percent of U.S. automotive fuel supplies now coming from ethanol could be achieved, several times over and at a fraction of the cost, by raising automobile fuel-efficiency standards by 20 percent.

On the food-versus-fuel issue, the world desperately needs leadership—a strategy to deal with the emerging food-fuel competition. As the world’s leading grain producer and exporter, as well as its largest producer of ethanol, the United States is in the driver’s seat.

Update:

Larry West from About.com – Water Now More Valuable Than Oil?

The most valuable commodity in the world today, and likely to remain so for much of this century, is not oil, not natural gas, not even some type of renewable energy. It’s water—clean, safe, fresh water.

When you want to spot emerging trends, always follow the money. Today, many of the world’s leading investors and most successful companies are making big bets on water. Do a little research, and it’s easy to see why. There simply isn’t enough freshwater to go around, and the situation is expected to get worse before it gets better.

The United Nations estimates that by 2050 more than two billion people in 48 countries will lack sufficient water. Approximately 97 percent to 98 percent of the water on planet Earth is saltwater (the estimates vary slightly depending on the source). Much of the remaining freshwater is frozen in glaciers or the polar ice caps. Lakes, rivers and groundwater account for about 1 percent of the world’s potentially usable freshwater.

GE’s strategy is for its water division to invest in desalinization and purification in countries that have a shortage of freshwater. Saudi Arabia is expected to invest more than $80 billion in desalinization plants and sewer facilities by 2025 to meet the needs of its growing population. And while China is home to 20 percent of the world’s people, only 7 percent of the planet’s freshwater supply is located there.

Clearly, natural resources like freshwater are becoming scarcer and hence, costlier.