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A Tall, Cool Drink of ... Sewage?

nytimes.com — In the world ’s driest places, the future of drinking water may flow from a wastewater-recycling plant.

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  • smacksaw, on 08/10/2008, -3/+29I can imagine the first time the author tasted it: "Wow, is that Diet Mountain Dew?"
  • inthewind99, on 08/10/2008, -1/+9Wow, interesting article.
  • styrchn, on 08/10/2008, -1/+14At what point along the process does the water start not feeling like sewer water? If it went straight from the treatment plant back into the tap I'd be repulsed, but into a lake...I think I can deal. Love the initiative overall.
    • fafnir314, on 08/11/2008, -3/+0You mean tasting like sewer water?
    • cawfee, on 08/11/2008, -0/+5Right back into a lake with all the bird poop and airborne contaminants. Yipee.
      The last step, as said in the article, is unnecessary and exists soley as a comfort tool.
      • inigomntoya, on 08/11/2008, -0/+3Ironically - the water must then be filtered again to pull all of that nasty nature stuff out so that it can be used in our houses. It would be cheaper to just send it directly to the city water tanks.
    • Fordi, on 08/11/2008, -1/+3Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't most US cities already do wastewater recycling? I know for fact that Philadelphia does at the least (in fact, we have one of the cleanest water treatment systems in the world).

      I mean, hoo-rah on more places getting their water scrubbed proper before reingestion, but this is old news.
    • drmangrum, on 08/11/2008, -0/+3Water strait from the plant is pretty damn clean. Dirty jobs did a segment on it a while back, they said the water from the treatment plant is like 98% pure. That's pretty damn clean. It would still have to be further purified to meet human consumption standards, but plenty clean enough to dump back into nature and let it do it's thing.
  • acmaurer, on 08/10/2008, -2/+5I understand how this is a necessary move, but at the same time, people will always think of it as former sewage water
  • AmyVernon, on 08/10/2008, -0/+35The thing is, most water is former sewage water. Treated sewage is dumped back out in the environment, seeps back down into the aquifers or into lakes and rivers and is treated just like the rest of the drinking water. It's more of a psychological barrier.
    • nesagwa, on 08/11/2008, -2/+8Exactly.

      Dinosaurs ***** in that water youre drinking.
      • zombiedepot, on 08/11/2008, -0/+3So did Jesus, since they coexisted 6000 years ago.
    • OrangeCrush, on 08/11/2008, -0/+6The water on this planet has been here for the better part of 4 billion years. I'd go so far as to say ALL of it is recycled "sewage" at this point. Circle of life, folks.
    • TVarmy, on 08/11/2008, -0/+4Didn't somebody once do the math saying that if you drink a pint of water, chances are likely that George Washington once pissed one of those molecules out?

      I guess the probability of getting a molecule of water from someone varies with time. The older the figure, the higher the chances you come in contact with that water, I imagine. In essence, we are bathing in Julius Ceasar's leftovers.
  • chunkymonkey126, on 08/11/2008, -1/+0Yes please
  • rawg, on 08/11/2008, -2/+10It'll be hard enough getting people back to drinking tap water instead of bottled without the image of sewage treatment in the back of their minds. I, on the other hand, will imagine it as a stream of crystal clear water flowing from the virgin loins of a beautiful young woman with shiny hair and anime eyes straight into my joyful, overflowing drinking cup and it will make me happy.
    • Dozernotz, on 08/11/2008, -1/+8I have a website just for you.
    • OrangeCrush, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1If people want to waste their money on bottled water, why not let them? Most bottled water is just filtered tap water resold for a huge mark up anyway.
  • BXRWXR, on 08/11/2008, -1/+13Delicious Urineaid. It's good and good for you - because it was already in you.

  • lava, on 08/11/2008, -6/+2In before slurm comments.
  • soloman747, on 08/11/2008, -1/+8Dugg down. Headline needs to read: "In most of the world ’s places, drinking water flows from a wastewater-recycling plant."
    • ayeroxor, on 08/11/2008, -1/+2The bury brigade can continue to bury what they don't want to read, but it doesn't make it any less true...
    • norman619, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2No *****. Here in the US some places are have been recycling sewage and turning it into drinking water for a while now. Not sure why this is news. From what I understand sewage can also be turned into fuel.
      • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1as far as i know, most places only recycle water thats passed on to them from the cities closer to the source, they dont continually recycle the water. they pass it on from one city to the next and eventually into the ocean.
  • BHO4Prez, on 08/11/2008, -1/+3We followed the pipes up to a sunlit, metal-clad building where the water, now dosed with an antiscalant and sulfuric acid to lower its pH, was forced at high pressure through hundreds of white tubes filled with tightly spiraled sheets of plastic membranes. Reverse osmosis, Wildermuth says, stops cold almost all nonwater molecules (things like salts, viruses and pharmaceuticals). The stuff that’s removed is washed back to a pipe that discharges into the ocean.

    Ummm...why are they dumping all our crap back into the ocean?
    • cawfee, on 08/11/2008, -2/+1Where else would you like it? Do you propose they put it in crates and mail it to your house for storage? Almost every major waste-producing industry dumps their unaddressable garbage into the ocean. Out of sight, out of mind.
      • BHO4Prez, on 08/11/2008, -0/+0I'm not a environmental scientist or engineer so I don't know what to do. There must be a better way to deal with the waste then dumping it back into the ocean.
      • cawfee, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1But that would cost money, and nudging companies to invest funds into projects not necessary to ensure legality is a losing battle from the start.
      • Fordi, on 08/11/2008, -0/+3It would make better sense for them to run it through a facilitated oxidation reactor.

        e.g., pump dirty water into a heated rotating drum of spent activated carbon, get steam and mineral deposits out the other end.

        That is, distilled water, excess heat (the carbon literally breaks the input molecules), and oxidized metal compounds.

        The oxidized metals can be dumped into the ocean, knowing you're replenishing that which city life has removed (mineral-rich dust), the water re-used, and the heat used to keep the process going.
      • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1the best thing to do would be to recycle it
        eventually we will be going through it faster than it can develop
      • Fordi, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1@wuksta: You're correct; there's every reason to assume that oxidized metals and other simple compounds can be reused in other industrial processes. Separation and buyer sourcing are exercises for the reader.
  • rob3, on 08/11/2008, -0/+5Big wh00p, we do this in the UK already... process it to make it clean enough to drink, then put it into our streams and rivers (and the animals don't die then!) and then downstream it may be used again. We've done this for years.
    • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1well, this IS america you know.
      • rob3, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1Why's it being reported like it's new technology then? Severn Trent in the UK have been doing it since the 80's! New in America != New.
    • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1no, i agree. my point is that its american news and thats why its behind. this kind of stuff isnt really "newsworthy" or "important" in america.
  • ajbl, on 08/11/2008, -0/+5Still Better than bottled water.

    http://www.communitywater.com/core/content_tapvsbo ...
  • SuperVepr308, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Ahhhh *smack*, refreshing.
  • JazminMillion, on 08/11/2008, -1/+1This must be an introduction to the opposites!
  • macwac, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Singapore is already doing this at a facility named NEWater both for drinking, industrial use and reservoirs and is spreading this technology to the middle east.
  • adiyo011, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2As others pointed out, all water has pretty much been used millions of time. There's no such thing as "clean". However, I guess this is a good step in the right direction.

    Just waiting for the day that we'll be able to render salt water into potable water for really cheap and efficiently.
    • Fordi, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2Well, if you mean 'clean', as in, 'a water molecule that's never been near a molecule of fecal matter', then no, there's no such thing.

      If, however, you mean, 'cohesive liquid that is 99.9% water', then water treatment plant output is generally 'clean'.
  • Myztry, on 08/11/2008, -0/+5All that effort to scrub the water, only to have fish ***** in it to make people feel better.
  • dizzy113, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Why does this make me think of tank girl?
  • tnvwboy, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Am I the only one to notice that the first four glasses look like various beers?
    • carnivore0311, on 08/11/2008, -0/+0The last one looks like vodka.
  • drmangrum, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2People will only stop the hysteria when their paying as much for water as they are for gas. In this matter, better to just do what needs to be done and leave the public in the dark. Most people lack even the most basic understanding of water purification, you can explain until you're blue in the face, but most will still think it's lower grade water. Just have to get people to understand the water they're drinking now was pooped out of dinosaur 60 million years ago.
    • carnivore0311, on 08/11/2008, -0/+110 years ago bottled water was $1.50 a bottle...and gas was about $1.25 a gallon.
      • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1not for long. we are approaching a water crisis.
  • MacParrot, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Sewage, shaken...not stirred
  • fsjenkins2000, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2Where do you think water comes from? I mean the same amount of water that was here when the earth began is still here. You are in essence drinking dinosaur piss that has been filtered. Your great great great grandpa pissed on the ground back in the day and now someone else is sipping some hot brewed tea. Give it a rest. Filter it and drink up.
    • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1technically there could be more or less, oxygen and hydrogen being created or coming in from space and all that you know? but youre definitely right.
      people make me laugh.
  • grneye53, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1that will be shaken not stirred !
  • LogicBomB, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1I don't see the issue. I'd rather drink the water from carefully filtered ***** than water straight-up out of the lakes and rivers from any major city. Lake water shouldn't be dark green/brown...
  • ahhell, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2But does it have Electolytes??
  • pinchduck, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2As long as the end product is H2O, what is the problem?
    • TVarmy, on 08/11/2008, -1/+1I get my water brand new from the tailpipe of hydrogen vehicles. Why would I want to use water somebody's been using over and over? I don't buy used mattresses, so why would I compose 70% of my body from some dude's former piss?
      • wunksta, on 08/12/2008, -0/+1ALL WATER HAS BEEN USED OVER AND OVER AGAIN

        jesus christ, what do you think water is?
  • leerayIG88, on 08/11/2008, -1/+1mmmm, reminds me of 2girs1cup
  • whisperedlie, on 08/11/2008, -0/+6"Why the hell would we want to drink our own sewage?"

    BECAUSE YOU DON'T HAVE A CHOICE! If you think you're gonna show up at the Great Lakes with a straw and "get a little water", I'm going to chase you back to wonderful, beautiful, *perfect* California with a rifle. People need to come to grips with the fact that this day and age resources are becoming more and more scarce, as climate changes and population continues to skyrocket. We need to break silly mindsets and absurd assumptions. We need to embrace positive developments that can contribute to prolonging what little resources we have left. Provided, of course, they are proven to be safe, and I can only conclude that drinking water from such a treatment plant is just fine; people along the Lakes have been drinking water that touched sewage for years and years.
  • DeFex, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2this happens all the time in nature.
  • beng123, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1TLDR!
  • vagarach, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1If the stuff is purer than what people readily buy and drink out of a bottle from some 'natural spring' then there really is no issue to be had. It's hydrogen and oxygen, simple stuff.
  • TVarmy, on 08/11/2008, -0/+2So, if I peed in a brita water filter, how many times would I have to pass it through to get pure, premium Grey Goose? Assume I've been drinking.
  • TheMachine1, on 08/11/2008, -0/+1Reverse osmosis followed by hydrogen peroxide and UV light to break done traces of organics sounds like water that is purer water than any conventional water treatment plant produces.
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