Floating cities - the water supply problem

--- In spacesettlers@y..., "Dr. Omni" wrote:
> From: "Dr. Omni"
> To:
> Sent: segunda-feira, 19 de fevereiro de 2001 00:29
> Subject: [spacesettlers] Floating cities
>
> [snikt]
> > Also, until now Savage has not addressed a vital point (perhaps
the most
> > essential one) for building any floating city - but I'll not say
which
> point
> > is that until I finish this chapter and make sure that it will
not be
> > addressed at all...
> >
> [snikt]
>
> I've already finished the chapter about Aquarius and now I'm sure:
Savage
> does not write a single line about how people living in floating
cities in
> open sea would get drinkable water. I had to return to the section
where the
> functioning of the OTEC is explained and then I found out that he
simply did
> not bother to make explicit from where drinkable water would come
from: from
> the evaporator of the OTEC, which would produce enormous amounts of
> distilled water through a low-pressure process...
>
> However, for the "sea villages" that we are thinking about, OTECs
would not
> be an option, and water would have to come from another source. I
think that
> the most obvious source is: rain.
>
> Imagine a sea village built under a dome with a circular reservoir
around
> it. When it rains, water slides over the dome and falls in the
reservoir. If
> the reservoir gets overfilled, then part of the water can be pumped
to
> internal tanks. A dome with a diameter of only 100 m - perfectly
viable to
> our current civil engineering - could gather about 7900 m^3 of
water per
> year, considering an unremarkable rainfall of 1000 mm/year. If the
average
> sea villager consumes 145 l/day, then this dome could hold a
population of
> about 150.
>
> I'm considering just domestic consumption. For agricultural
purposes, it
> would be better to cover crops with hemicylindrical domes and use
other rain
> storage system. Or simply count with rain falling directly over the
plants,
> like in conventional agriculture...
>
> Also, although I talked about "domes", actually Im considering
any
shape
> able to gather rainfall. A pyramid of even a conventional roof
would be
> equally efficient, having the advantage of providing a much better
> occupation of space for humans. (Unlike Savage, I don't believe
that round
> shapes are practical, much on the contrary... Indeed, I think that
when he
> talks about the curvilinear internal architecture of Aquarius, he
was just
> pushing that "cybergenics" thing too far...)
>
> Dr. Omni
> ICQ# 53853815

Cruise ships, nuclear submarines, I'm pretty sure aircraft carriers
and really don't know about supertankers though I have a sneaking
suspicion; use desalinization of sea water for their water supply.
No reason ocean villages couldn't do the same. If they also collect
rain and do some serious recycling so much the better.