The Cellar » June 10, 2021: Lake Mead in Need

monster · 6/10/2021 9:30 pm

The largest reservoir in the US -created by the Hoover Dam- has reached a record low.

image credit: Reuters

here's the BBC story about it, but there are many others.

griff · 6/11/2021 6:33 am

grim

BigV · 6/11/2021 4:45 pm

think how much precipitation it will take to restore it to the level where the color of the rocks changes. The story I heard is that this will require *years* of rainy seasons to replenish the water. Drought for the foreseeable future.

Diaphone Jim · 6/12/2021 11:24 am

Wouldn't it be full if not overdrawn by the demands of the folks in four (desert) states and two countries.
Given those, maybe even record rains wouldn't help.

xoxoxoBruce · 6/14/2021 3:45 pm

Good point, the more there is the more they'll want to draw off.

footfootfoot · 6/14/2021 6:58 pm

Computers make everything so much better. Stop whining about the cost."A typical semiconductor manufacturing facility uses two to four million gallons of ultra-pure water per day. In 2015, Intel, the largest semiconductor company by market capitalization, used nine billion gallons of water."Mar 22, 2017

xoxoxoBruce · 6/14/2021 11:54 pm

Then run it through an RO filter and reuse it for something. It's not like it's consumed it's just sullied a little.

footfootfoot · 6/15/2021 1:35 pm

I'm not sure what they do with it but apparently it doesn't make it back to the aquifer.

Oh wait. I missed the RO filter joke. Whoosh.

Last edited by footfootfoot (6/15/2021 1:36 pm)

xoxoxoBruce · 6/15/2021 10:19 pm

It was a pretty lame joke.
For all I know the water could be highly toxic with chemicals and/or heavy metals.
But that raises the question what do they do with that much water.

Diaphone Jim · 6/16/2021 12:03 pm

I'm sure Louie Gohmert could sovle that problem if we just gave him the chance.

xoxoxoBruce · 6/16/2021 2:38 pm

I doubt he'd fix anything, he'd just blame Pelosi.

BigV · 6/16/2021 6:55 pm

Diaphone Jim wrote:
I'm sure Louie Gohmert could sovle that problem if we just gave him the chance.

I watched a clip where he name dropped the smart ppl at NASA and asked the poor person trapped in a conversation with him. He used the gravitas of his name drop to try to lend some ... I don't know, I find it hard to empathize with Rep Gohmert... He asked this woman could we change the orbit of the moon or the earth to combat climate change.

do you even hear the words coming out of your mouth?

I just can't even.

Happy Monkey · 6/16/2021 8:40 pm

What he said was dumb in at least two ways, but not in the obvious way.

First, it was dumb because taken out of context it sounds like he thinks we can move the moon, which (remarkably) makes him seem even dumber than he actually is - and he provided little to no context.

Second, he was trying to make a snide implication that climate change is affected by the radius of the moon's orbit increasing over time, and since we obviously can't stop that, it's worthless to do anything about climate change. The moon's orbit's radius changes by about 4 cm per year, and is 384,000 km. It's not affecting climate change.

monster · 6/16/2021 9:18 pm

Is this "Draining The Swamp"?

Perhaps we could fill it up with foamand party?

Correct, not serious

BigV · 6/17/2021 8:29 pm

Happy Monkey wrote:
What he said was dumb in at least two ways, but not in the obvious way.

First, it was dumb because taken out of context it sounds like he thinks we can move the moon, which (remarkably) makes him seem even dumber than he actually is - and he provided little to no context.

Second, he was trying to make a snide implication that climate change is affected by the radius of the moon's orbit increasing over time, and since we obviously can't stop that, it's worthless to do anything about climate change. The moon's orbit's radius changes by about 4 cm per year, and is 384,000 km. It's not affecting climate change.

yeah...
respectfully, it's *super* dumb in the abundantly, completely obvious way.

And... all the other ways too.

fargon · 6/18/2021 8:26 am

They moved the Moon in the movie "Recess: Schools Out".

tw · 6/18/2021 9:39 am

Soon we can kayak in what was once Lake Meade. With rapids, one can feel that plenty of water exists.

griff · 6/18/2021 11:17 am

Seems like solid evidence.