why isn’t ocean water filtered and used when somewhere is having a water crisis?
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The places that use desalination all have money and energy to burn on the process. It is pretty expensive to maintain a desalination plant. The process to desalinate relies on levels of filtering way beyond what we normally think of for filtered water because salt can get through a normal filtration system that is operating on a large scale. Even in California where water shortages are many, it has been slow going to construct the ones they have, and then you have to send that water against gravity to get it to places that need it. It’s pretty expensive and so is slow to come into the market. That being said, the technology IS being used in many places , which means innovation will continue to happen and maybe some day soon the scale will tip toward “affordable enough” to be tried in poorer areas that suffer from water crises.
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