Posted on 02/07/2024 4:38:54 AM PST by xoxox
More Communism will solve that.
Or some Flex-Seal.
Why aren't they reusing the fresh water from the locks? Sounds like that when they empty a lock, they're just dumping the water and then refilling the next time from Gatun Lake.
Just pump the water back into the lake and use it again.
Yeah, well, you should have thought of that before you built it.
Counting on WEATHER as part of your operating necessity?
It’s a true technological marvel. Read David McCullough’s “The Path Between The Seas” for the full story.
< sigh >
Do we REALLY have to go through this again?
The Panama Canal is not at sea level, and it is not powered by sea water. It's powered by fresh water, derived from rain, and stored in artificial lakes.
1) Panama is currently experiencing a time of less than normal rainfall. Therefore, less fresh water is available to run the canal.
2) The ChiComs doubled the carrying capacity of the canal locks, but they didn't double the amount of fresh water available to run it ...
I'm sure you can take it from there, to understand the nature of the problem.
Pump? With WHAT?
The whole point of a gravity driven canal lock system is that YOU DON'T NEED PUMPS. They work spectacularly well when idiots don't run them beyond capacity.
It would take a while, but if we just made the Rio Grande wide and deep enough to be a canal, would that replace the Panama Canal? It would make the border crossings more of a chore.
In the more than 100 years the canal has existed have there never been any droughts? The canal though well engineered, is based on the engineering of 100 years ago. Could there in all these years have been a rethinking of how the canal operates that would conserve the water needed to run the canal?
Can’t be drying up. Not with all the flooding from the icebergs melting.
“Did nothing on increasing water reserves/holding lakes.”
Bingo!
Congratulations!
You just won the Internet!!!
Didn’t Carter give it to the CCP?
Are you saying both ends of the Panama Canal are not at sea level? Pump water to the lake and keep it flowing.
The canal is above sea level. That’s why there are locks. The locks do not operate on pumps. There are no pumps. There is no power supply to run pumps. That’s not how a canal works.
The canal is fed by FRESH water, derived from rain and stored in the artificial Gatun Lake. Said fresh water is fed by gravity into the locks, and then into the sea (where it would have ended up without the canal). It’s a simple and elegant system. Don’t fsck it up.
And that’s what the ChiComs did: they fscked it up. The original designers knew how much rainfall to expect in Panama, and designed a canal to use a bit less water than that. The ChiComs doubled the canal’s carrying capacity without doubling its water supply. And now the canal is in trouble. Duh.
Pumping huge amounts of saltwater into a freshwater system, aside from consuming astronomical amounts of electrical power, will also screw up the system. The plant and animal life in and around the canal is freshwater, not saltwater, life.
Seriously: gravity fed canal locks are an elegant engineering marvel. If such things interest you at all, your time would be well spent learning a bit about how they work.
I know that. I've been there, remember. Taken the tour. Seen how it all works.
No, obviously, I'm talking about ADDING pumps to the system. You know, since it's almost not working now.
According to this link, New Orleans now has a set of 17 pumps that will pump 11 million gallons PER MINUTE.
And according to this, each lock holds between 48 and 52 million gallons of water.
Whereas the existing locks use 52 million gallons (197 million litres) with each use, the new locks use 48 million gallons (182 million litres).
Certainly sounds like a do-able plan to me.
That is good info, but a couple of questions, if the locks bring in the ships from the sea would the water in the canal be brackish rather than fresh water? Wouldn’t plant and wildlife as you say in the canal mess up the works? I get it may be expensive to pump saltwater to the top lock but is it better to have the canal continue to work?
Thanks again for the info, you are helping me understand it better.
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