Katie Park, the graphics editor at The Washington Post recently published an elegant data visualisation of the impact of the Californian drought on water storage levels.
California is in the fourth year of its most severe drought on record, facing low precipitation, dwindling mountain snowpack levels and the hottest temperatures in state history. The water supply in the state’s reservoirs has dropped to historic lows, especially in the central part of the state.
Not a plant to be seen, the desert ground is too dry.
But the air contains water, and research scientists have found a way of obtaining drinking water from air humidity. The system is based completely on renewable energy and is therefore autonomous.
Cracks permeate the dried-out desert ground, the landscape bears testimony to the lack of water.
But even here, where there are no lakes, rivers or groundwater, considerable quantities of water are stored in the air.
In the Negev desert in Israel, for example, annual average relative air humidity is 64 percent – in every cubic meter of air there are 11.5 milliliters of water.
Drinking Water From Air Humidity.
[ScienceDaily: Latest Science News]
[Note: I was in Israel in the early 90’s and while on a tour a similar [yet simpler] type of device was described to us as “harvesting the morning air” -BC]