Thread by @opinion

More than a few dystopian fantasies depict a future in which humanity’s water supply derives from recycled human waste.

Today, elements of these visions are becoming a reality trib.al/R24jQCt

In 1965, Frank Herbert released his novel "Dune" — now a much-anticipated blockbuster — where humans inhabiting a rainless planet must wear “stillsuits”— a rubbery second skin that captures sweat, urine and feces and recycles them into drinking water trib.al/R24jQCt

While no climate models predict a future without rain on Earth, all show severe disturbances in hydrology:

☔️Increasingly excessive rain
🌊Flooding in some region
🌵Intensifying drought in others
trib.al/R24jQCt

California has now become a leading example of drought.

Suffering through a prolonged dry period, utilities are increasingly relying on sewage to generate the state's water needs trib.al/R24jQCt

🚽Known as “recycled wastewater” or “toilet to tap,” this water source understandably triggers a gag reflex in some consumers — but it shouldn't.

It is quickly becoming the most important element of a drought-proof water supply in the climate-change era trib.al/R24jQCt

🚰The water itself is as pure and delicious as anything you might buy bottled from the Swiss Alps.

In fact, some southern Californians already have been drinking recycled wastewater for years, thanks to a pilot project in Orange County trib.al/R24jQCt

Governor Gavin Newsom's $5.1 billion drought-response package focuses heavily on making this sustainable source more available.

But this shouldn't remain just another California experiment, it should extend to drought-prone states like Texas and Florida trib.al/R24jQCt

There's no state in our union that faces more economic peril from an unstable water supply than California.

In 2014, during the last severe drought, the state racked up more than $2 billion in agricultural losses alone trib.al/R24jQCt

Roughly 80% of the water for agricultural and urban use flows to California farms, which in turn grow more than half of all U.S.-produced:

🍇Fruits
🥜Nuts
🥦Vegetables

The dairy cows that graze in CA's pastures produce 20% of the national milk supply trib.al/R24jQCt

One option that's been explored is desalination, a filtration method that strips salt from ocean water.

Yet recycling wastewater is much cheaper:

🧂Desalinated water costs about $3,000 per acre-foot
🚽Recycled wastewater costs $1,800 per acre-foot trib.al/R24jQCt

Both types of water are treated mechanically, pumped through a multi-step filtration process that culminates with reverse-osmosis membranes that pull out:

🔬Visible particles
🦠Viruses
🦠Pathogens
🧪Hormone-disrupting chemicals
🧂Salt
trib.al/R24jQCt

In 2008, Orange County Water District opened a $490 million toilet-to-tap facility.

The plant pumped 100 million gallons a day in 2018, making it the world’s largest recycled wastewater plant trib.al/R24jQCt

🇸🇬🇮🇱Singapore and Israel, among other countries with limited freshwater resources, have been recycling their wastewater for decades while the U.S. resisted.

We get it: Even amid the desperation of drought, consuming your own waste is nobody’s first choice trib.al/R24jQCt

Here’s what’s changed: The realities of climate change, and even Herbert’s “Dune” dystopia, are increasingly upon us.

The technology has gotten better, too, producing an excellent product that tastes nothing like ocean brine or sewage trib.al/R24jQCt