Day 0

Mynight · 21 May 2018 at 14:07

Conscript said:
Reminds me of this:
https://www.creepypasta.com/evaporation/

Hadn't read that before. Glad to see I'm not the only one with a grand plan come drought

.

Seriously though if you know it's coming filling bath tubs and sinks then covering with plastic would keep you going for a fair while.

Quick google suggests ~80-100 litres of water in a bath. Average person drinks 2 litres per day. Could happily keep a single person going for just over a month. If water isn't restored by then you're pretty stuffed.

Participant · 21 May 2018 at 14:08

beargryllspiss.gif

joey1211 · 21 May 2018 at 14:19

How many times can you drink your own urine?

glenimp617 · 21 May 2018 at 14:20

on a planet full of water, the mind boggles as to why anyone is thirsty

hominid · 21 May 2018 at 14:45

From what I read a while back, so I'm paraphrasing, is that the government wanted all companies, either state owned and private, that supplied them to be as ethnically diverse as the country. That's roughly 1:5 white to black, again roughly speaking but it may be somewhat different.

Engineers working for the water company where predominantly white, almost all of them at the time this came into effect. so what the water company did was fire enough of the white engineers for this ratio to be adjusted, then they couldn't find enough black water engineers to fill the jobs. Instead of filling the jobs to keep the company running, they've left the jobs open still looking for these black engineeers.

I can't find the exact story I read at teh time, but this one talk about the same issue: https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Eskom-must-shed-1-081-white-engineers-20150308

Also the nation government meddling with projects that would have sorted this years back didn't help either.

Here's a story about the affirmative action targets directly: https://mywage.co.za/decent-work/fair-treatment/affirmative-action

Django x2 · 21 May 2018 at 14:55

rainbowGuy said:
i

if we know that water is h20 why cant we produce it artificially? just bung those 'gasses' together.. :s

I think regardless of when it happens, we waste too much water.. we can start those initiatives right now..

Thankfully its H2O and not H20....

You have to burn Hydrogen to make water. Humans suck at burning hydrogen

Caracus2k · 21 May 2018 at 14:56

TheOracle said:
on a planet full of water, the mind boggles as to why anyone is thirsty

Because 97% of it is undrinkable as it is saline (and very expensive to de salinise) and 2% of it is locked up in ice (where we want it to stay)........

about 97 percent of the Earth's water can be found in our oceans. Of the tiny percentage that's not in the ocean, about two percent is frozen up in glaciers and ice caps. Less than one percent of all the water on Earth is fresh. A tiny fraction of water exists as water vapor in our atmosphere.

glenimp617 · 21 May 2018 at 14:58

Caracus2k said:
Because 97% of it is undrinkable as it is saline (and very expensive to de salinise) and 2% of it is locked up in ice (where we want it to stay)........

I can guarantee if the western world suddenly became thirsty, it wouldn't be expensive

Caracus2k · 21 May 2018 at 15:00

TheOracle said:
I can guarantee if the western world suddenly became thirsty, it wouldn't be expensive

I guarantee you it would!..... With current tech in the region of at least twice as expensive!

Do you think companies are just going to give water away for nothing to 'western' consumers?

Or do you think there's some 'miracle' tech being held in reserve?

Chris Wilson · 21 May 2018 at 15:06

When did the UK last build a new reservoir? The last big `un I can recall is when they flooded the Goyt Valley in the Peak District to build Fernilee reservoir and that took years and years of planning wrangling as many farms and houses disappeared beneath the reservoir.

edit: Oops, no I think Kielder was the last. Started in 1975 and opened in 1982.

joey1211 · 21 May 2018 at 15:31

Caracus2k said:
Do you think companies are just going to give water away for nothing to 'western' consumers?

They've already convinced a lot of us to buy it at 420 times the price of tap water.

glenimp617 · 21 May 2018 at 15:32

Caracus2k said:
I guarantee you it would!..... With current tech in the region of at least twice as expensive!

Do you think companies are just going to give water away for nothing to 'western' consumers?

Or do you think there's some 'miracle' tech being held in reserve?

No, I think people would pull together and do whatever is needed to get drinkable water

joey1211 · 21 May 2018 at 15:33

No, the powers that be would ration it and profit from our need.

Kenai · 21 May 2018 at 15:53

Chris Wilson said:
When did the UK last build a new reservoir? The last big `un I can recall is when they flooded the Goyt Valley in the Peak District to build Fernilee reservoir and that took years and years of planning wrangling as many farms and houses disappeared beneath the reservoir.

Depends on your vision of a reservoir, you'll find that supply reservoirs are being built fairly frequently. Surface water storage ones probably less so but it's all locally planned anyway as there is no real facility to shift water around the country.

StriderX · 21 May 2018 at 16:03

hominid said:
From what I read a while back, so I'm paraphrasing, is that the government wanted all companies, either state owned and private, that supplied them to be as ethnically diverse as the country. That's roughly 1:5 white to black, again roughly speaking but it may be somewhat different.

Engineers working for the water company where predominantly white, almost all of them at the time this came into effect. so what the water company did was fire enough of the white engineers for this ratio to be adjusted, then they couldn't find enough black water engineers to fill the jobs. Instead of filling the jobs to keep the company running, they've left the jobs open still looking for these black engineeers.

I can't find the exact story I read at teh time, but this one talk about the same issue: https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Eskom-must-shed-1-081-white-engineers-20150308

Also the nation government meddling with projects that would have sorted this years back didn't help either.

Here's a story about the affirmative action targets directly: https://mywage.co.za/decent-work/fair-treatment/affirmative-action

You know considering Zimbabwe, that great nation we all know and love, is their next door neighbour... they might've realised that being equally as racist towards people is kinda not productive.

What a beautiful couple of nations who could have easily been a world(ish) power with the wealth they had under their feet, instead they'd rather be petty bigots.

dowie · 21 May 2018 at 16:04

Mynight said:
Depends how long it lasts and what time of year.

Bottled water would sell out quickly. Probably some fights happening whilst bottles are sold.

Few days people would start dying. Hospitals would be getting busier. Public services would probably shut down.

End of week gangs stealing water.

End of month vampirism to get the last water out of people.

Or we'd just buy in water from another country or hope water aid would take pity on us. Unless it hit most of Europe simultaneously they'd just keep their water.

Brb stockpiling water.

And anyone with an IQ > 100 can just pop down to the beach and get some water to distil, assuming they've not already fled the place and/or exhausted the swimming pool, bath tub and any other sticks they made in the build up.

PlacidCasual · 21 May 2018 at 16:07

Abingdon reservoir got canned after local action, I don't suppose we should take too much of a high ground on infrastructure planning.

dowie · 21 May 2018 at 16:08

terley said:
As

said

The water crisis is purely political coruptness, there has been no attempt to create water distillation plants, even though cape town is surrounded by water.

Yup, the Cape is the one area where the ANC doesn't hold power and as a result the federal govt doesn't seem to care much.

Mynight · 21 May 2018 at 16:51

dowie said:
And anyone with an IQ > 100 can just pop down to the beach and get some water to distil, assuming they've not already fled the place and/or exhausted the swimming pool, bath tub and any other sticks they made in the build up.

But that's no fun

.