Water Table in a Habitat

--- In ssi_list@... "victoriatangoman"
> --- In ssi_list@... Ian Woollard
> >
> > >Even so, what happens to the water that percolates through the
> soil?
> > >
> > What happens on earth? It goes into a drain which goes down hill
> and
> > leads to a river. The river leads to a lake or a sea. Do the same
> thing
> > on a habitat and pump the water out of the lake, process/filter
> it, and
> > rain it back down again. Is this hard?
>
> On Earth, some water stays near, or on, the surface, flows down
> hill, joins a river, then to a lake. Other water percolates through
> the ground until it hits impermeable rock, then flows along those
> contours until it finds its way to a lake, or if the underground
> contours prohibit water flow to a lake, the accumulated water
> becomes an aquafer.
>
> In a Habitat, the Island 3 variety, with the farming (traditional
or
> hydroponic, carried out elsewhere, the flora will need to be
> sustained with water. If there is indeed some "natural" weather
> system, then rain will occur. In the parts of the Habitat that are
> urbanized, the rain will fall on rooftops, city streets, sidewalks,
> etc, all impermeable, and that water can be channeled to drains,
> sewer mains, lakes, etc.
>
> How about the wter that falls on your lawn, rose garden, city
parks,
> etc? As I see it most will be evaporated or used by the flora, but
> some will be excess, and I don't think we want to have a aquafer
> accumulating against the pressure hull, do we?
>
> So, do we line the dirt with those big plastic sheets that they now
> use to line landfills. They're supposed to last for thousands of
> years.
>
> Or do we have a cast basalt liner around the interior of the
Habitat
> constructed in the form of many small peaks and valleys. The water
> wouldn't be able to permeate the basalt liner, it would flow down
> the slope to the valley bottom, where we could use pipes like they
> use for septic fields, namely, ones that have holes in them to
allow
> the water to enter the pipe but not escape it. Then channel the
flow
> through a pipe system to a central reservoir.
>
> Is this over-engineering the problem? Is this a problem at all?
>
> Nevertheless, I do believe the solution has to be maintenance free
> for the entire life of the Habitat because it may be difficult to
> repair or maintain such a system when building will be built over
> the surface thus prohibiting access.
>
> Do you see a simpler way to replicate the water reclamation cycle?
>
> TangoMan

What you have described is what I was describing when I said that it
should have a double wall so that maintenance personnel (or robots)
will have inspection access to the pressure hull. The double hull
(or Basalt layer as you described) could simply have a drain tile
that caries away water that has percolated though the dirt. This, of
course, only describes one segment of the water cycle on board. The
entire water cycle would need to be carefully engineered.