Eli5 if salt water turns to fresh water when it evaporates how do we have water shortages in coastal regions or water shortages in general?

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Eli5 if salt water turns to fresh water when it evaporates how do we have water shortages in coastal regions or water shortages in general?

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Evaporating water is relatively difficult. The sun will evaporate water and produce fresh water rain, but if not enough falls where you are then you can have a shortage. Even if you are near the ocean it doesn’t mean that you can practically produce fresh water from the salt water.

It takes a lot of energy to boil water. People expect their fresh water to be relatively cheap, and the energy required to boil off a bathtub’s worth of water is going to be more expensive than people want to pay for a bath.

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