Water Storage

As water becomes more difficult to obtain we are going to be forced into looking for better solutions.
This is a section of a modular water wall.

I did a quick search and others are also thinking along these lines and some of the walls are very decorative.  The idea of free or cheap drums is admirable but they are not large enough nor are they aesthetic.
 
It's time to think outside the box.  What about large reservoirs of water under our houses or hidden within our walls which would also be used to moderate temperature with it's thermo-mass.

I used to live in a very old house in downtown Tucson.  The walls were built of adobe and they were nearly 3 feet thick.  The hot Tucson summers were quite bearable due to the thermo-mass of these walls even though I had no air conditioning.

If we were to build houses like this our energy and water consumption would both drop.  A stucco finish would make the walls look like any other house except for thick walls, and the comfort would be amazing.  This water could be collected during the rainy season and used later in the hot dry summer months to grow food and ensure a beautiful cooling landscape.

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A family of five uses  about 1 acre foot (about 325,000 gallons) or (1225 m³) of water a year.  So saving water from your roof top may only make a small difference, but small differences add up.   Right now it costs about $1000 to process that much water from waste water or to build a new reservoir.  

Desalination has been done in other parts of the world and California is going to build a desalination plant in San Diego capable of 50 million gallons (189000 m³) a day.  But the cost is probably going to be twice the cost we are used to.  There are also concerns that the plant will kill fish, but efforts are being incorporated that should solve this problem.

In total fifteen desalination projects using reverse osmosis are proposed along the coast from Los Angeles to San Francisco Bay.  In the past many other desalination plants have been closed due to the high cost of operation.  The plant will use an enormous amount of energy -- about 38 megawatts, enough to power 28,500 homes.  
The efficiency works out to be about 3 kWh for 1 m³or 88 gallons / kWh fresh water.  Sounds like a lot of water, but the reality is this will only provide about 7 percent of the total water needs of San Diego County.   

Another problem I see is that this is going to be privately owned.  I would prefer to see communities own their own water source.

Why I Buy Organic & Non-GMO & Support Local Organic Farmers

Organic farmers are stewards of the land rather than soil rapers
 
Organic food is free of chemicals

GMO farmers use more aggressive control measures, such as increased use of chemical sprays. 

Organic food is free of unsustainable petroleum fertilizers
 
Organic food promotes better health.
 
Organic food tastes richer, sweeter and is more satisfying
 
Organic food uses natural defenses, and has no unhealthy pesticides

Bio-engineered crops harm species that are not their target, such as monarch butterflies. 

Organic growers use sustainable methods of growing food that promote soil health rather than destroying the soil

GMO transfer pesticide-resistant genes to related weeds may produce "super weeds"  immune to commonly used control methods

Nature adapts and may begin to produce 'super bugs' putting heirloom plants at a disadvantage.

Locally grown food costs less to ship
 
Locally grown organic food uses less fuel to deliver to consumer
 
Locally grown organic food is fresher
 
Locally grown organic fruit tastes better
 
Locally grown organic fruit has a higher nutrient value than fruit picked early.
 
Seasonal vegetables taste better and deliver diversity through out the year
 
Organic growers are more productive
 
Organic growers use less fuel hungry machinery
 
Local organic farmers employ local people
 
Organic growers use  less water
 
Organic growers use Non GMO seed
 
Organic growers do not use toxic Roundup.  Glysophate is the listed active ingredient, but the other ingredients are even more toxic
 
Organic growers do not have to lie about the toxic chemicals in and on their food
 
GMO crops are infecting heirloom crops
 
Organic growers provide better variety and seed diversity
 
Less wasted produce when you buy from local organic farmers.

Ordinary, familiar foods can become allergenic through the addition of foreign genes.
 

Locally grown food lasts longer


Maybe you can help be think of more reasons to support local and organic farmers.

For more detailed information about GMO [CLICK HERE]

Microbes

Nematode

Mycillium attached to nematode.

Ten Calories Of Energy To Produce One Calorie Of Food.

I just read the article  "The Permaculture Solution – an Interview with Warren Brush". It said "Estimates are that the modern agriculture system uses ten calories of energy to produce one calorie of food."

Fearing that I too may be growing negative net energy food. I immediately looked at the energy costs involved with my soil-less gardens. My hydroponic pump uses 160 watts-hours per day or 137.6 KCal or about 576 KJ/day.   Chris Carr was kind enough to remind me that nutritional calories (KCal) are equal to 1000 chemistry calories (cal).    A chemist would probably use Joules and Kilo-Joules (KJ) rather than KCal.   But the we think of food in terms of KCalories rather than Joules, so I'll keep it in KCal also known as large calories as much as I can.  There were other errors in my first draft,  so here's the rewrite.  Many of my calculations will be done using the 'Energy and Work Unit Conversion' at unit-conversion.info/energy.html. 

I did some research and found a daily harvest of 8lbs of lettuce and 100lbs of tomatoes to be respectable averages for a 100sf garden. So I will be using those figures throughout.
Just for grins lets say you irrigate 100 square feet of garden with 10 gallons per day, and you are pumping water from let's say 100 feet below the surface. 

To calculate the power used to pump 10 gallons per minute 100'

P_whp = q h sg / 3960

where

P_whp = water horsepower (hp)
q = flow (gal/min)    = (10)
h = head (ft)              = (100)
sg = specific gravity = (1)

P_whp = 10x100/3960 = .2525whp = 0.04497210699688 KCal/sec
This could also be expressed as 188.2892175745  J/sec which is the definition of a Watt.

If you are following along and checking my math you can use the 'Power Unit Conversion' to find the Power.
Power and Energy are different.  Energy is what is delivered and Power is the rate at which it is delivered.
In the above example we deliver 188 Watts for 10 minutes or 31.38 Watt-Hours



We pump for 10 minute so
0.04497210699688 KCal/s  x  600sec = 26.9 KCal
So how many lbs of vegetables would you need to produce 26.9 KCal
Lettuce is 67.37 KCal per lb so you would need 26.9/67.37 = 0.40 lbs of lettuce per day from your 100 sq ft garden. If you harvest 8lbs / day the net gain is 19.97 times
Tomato is 80 KCal per lb so you would need 26.9/80 = 0.34 lbs of tomatoes per day from your 100 sq ft garden  If you harvest 100lbs / day the net gain is 296 times

Below is a list of common vegetables which I got from http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calories_in_vegetables.htm


Let's put this in perspective of a soil-less aquaponic or hydroponic system:
Let's say you use a 20 watt pump 5 hours a day.
    That's 20 watt-hours x 5 hours/day = 100 Watt-Hours / day  (W-Hr/day)
    Each W-Hr is equal to 0.859845227859  KCal so you spend about 86.0 KCal to pump water each day.

If you grow 8 lbs of lettuce per day on your 100 sq ft aquaponics garden,
8lb/day x 67368 cal/lb = 538944 cal/day or  ,  538.944Kcal/day

You would spend 86.0 KCal to pump water to produce 538.944 KCal of lettuce.
A return of over 6.27 to 1.  Not quite 19.97 times like soil gardening but pretty good!



How about tomatoes...
Lets say you grow 100 lbs of tomatoes per day in your 100 sq ft garden.   
Let also say you use the same amount of electricity - (86.0 KCal/day).
100 lb/day x 80 KCal/lb = 8000 calories/day
So you would spend 86.0 KCal/day to produce 8000 KCal of tomatoes.
A return of over 92 to 1.  Soil gardening was 296 but this is not bad!

Compared to soil gardening the power efficiency is not as good, but water is also a commodity worth preserving and my guess is any of the soil-less methods will beat soil based gardening several times over.   It gets pretty complicated if you consider that some of the water applied to soil returns to the aquifer but ponics are definitely more efficient with water.  

Back to my hydroponic system which consumes 137.6 KCal per day.  It would need to produce 1.72 lbs of tomatoes per day.  But this is just the power used to move water.  Warren Brush was including the power used to make fertilizers, mine, and apply nutrients, and maintain the crop from start to finish.  That's beyond the data available to me, but at least it still looks like a positive net gain whether you are gardening with soil or without and probably far better than the modern agriculture system using ten calories of energy to produce one calorie of food.

Aquaponics has a side benefit of fish protein which I have not included, but the energy used to make fish food should be considered.  Bioponics on the other hand is free of any further input save iron and magnesium which is also required in aquaponics.


I'll admit this article was difficult for me,  I feel like I have dyslexia where it comes to keeping units straight.  If you find any errors I will correct them, but to my best knowledge I have presented this correctly.

Did You Know

The average gardener spends about $70 on a 600 sq ft garden and reaps about $530 in return!

It can take a few years to build your soil, but start a garden now and enjoy fresh wholesome food you can serve with pride.  Gardening is good for the soul and will bring joy to your life as you learn each year how to do it better.    Gardening promotes good physical and mental health.

Worms break up that rough, dense layer of dead grass, stems and root call thatch in your lawn. Thatch blocks the flow of nutrients and water.

It will be difficult to deny the probability that every particle of earth... has pasted through the intestines of worms - Charles Darwin

Worms eat the nematodes that feed on roots.  Unchecked the cause yellowing, wilting and bare patches in your lawn.

There is often 5 times more nitrogen in soil with worms.

Soil with worms will have as much as 7 times more phosphate, and 11 times more potassium.

P N K - Nitrogen Potassium, and Phosphate are the major nutrient requirement of plants

Worms eat harmful bacteria, fungi, and microbes while increasing the amount of beneficial microbes.

Worms fertilize the soil with their waste. Worm castings are more nutrient rich than the soil initially consumed.

Worms are the intestines of the earth - Aristotle

Keep your worms fed by creating an earthworm stack of leaves, kitchen scrapes and other vegetation.   Leave grass clippings on the lawn after mowing and be careful with the pesticides and herbicides you use.  They often kill worms.

Did you know that the 'inactive ingredients' found in pesticides are often 1000 times more toxic than the 'principal active ingredient', and tests done on just one ingredient are often not as toxic as the combination of ingredients.  This presents a false sense of safety.

Roundup was found in this experiment to be 125 times more toxic than glyphosate. Moreover, despite its reputation, Roundup was by far the most toxic among the herbicides and insecticides tested. This inconsistency between scientific fact and industrial claim may be attributed to huge economic interests, which have been found to falsify health risk assessments and delay health policy decisions -
European Environment Agency. EEA Report.Copenhagen, Denmark: European Environment Agency; 2013. Late lessons from early warnings: science, precaution, innovation.

Fungicides were the most toxic from concentrations 300–600 times lower than agricultural dilutions, followed by herbicides and then insecticides, with very similar profiles in all cell types. Despite its relatively benign reputation, Roundup was among the most toxic herbicides and insecticides tested.

Chronic tests on pesticides may not reflect relevant environmental exposures if only one ingredient of these mixtures is tested alone.
 

Water Facts

From Ensia.com
http://ensia.com/infographics/are-we-on-the-path-to-peak-water/

 For more:
http://www.waterfootprint.org/

Growing fruit from seed.

http://www.homemadehomeideas.com/10-surprising-foods-you-didnt-know-you-could-grow-at-home/

Avocados – This detailed method and demonstration will allow you to grow beautiful avocodoes in your own home.
Blueberries – They are one of the most antioxidant rich foods in the world and have been found to fight against cancer, aid brain health and preserve vision among many other things.
Pomegranate – Start these little beauties off indoors and once ready transfer into your garden.
Oranges – If you nurture these small seeds and take care of them, these will grow into a perfect orange tree – providing you with bundles of vitamin C.
Grapefruit - Transform a tiny seed into a beautiful grapefruit plant.
Lemons - It’s so simple to do, it needs very little equipment and just a single seed from an organic lemon.
Limes – A lengthy process, but such a treat when complete.
Banana - They are surprisingly easy to grow, you will save plenty on your shopping bill and the kids will love eating something they have grown.
Pineapples – By using the top of a pineapple you can grow a whole pineapple tree.
Tangerines – All you need is a suitable container, quality potting soil, and dedicated cultural care to help to ensure you grow a healthy regular fruit producing plant.