Desalination and the Dodo bird
For a country with only 1.2 million residents and a record rainfall of almost three meters per year, you wouldn’t think that the tiny island nation of the Republic of Mauritius would have a water supply problem. But as of January 2011, local reservoirs are only at roughly 30-40 percent of capacity and the Minister of Energy and Public Utilities is pushing legislation to encourage local hotels to install desalination units saying that such technology is a reliable alternative to treating fresh water as a result of energy-efficient technologies.
Since 2005, all new hotels in Mauritius are required to accommodate desalination as well as recycling and reuse of water. Some hotels are currently desalinating 800 cubic meters of water per day or roughly 200,000 gallons. In the US, hotels use an average of 209 gallons of water each day per occupied room.
Due to the water crisis, the government has passed regulations restricting the use of potable water to wash vehicles, pavements, buildings, and to water lawns. Violators could be subject to fines of Rs 200,000 (US$6,800) and up to two years in prison.
Despite plans for two new large water storage projects, the opposition party is also calling for increased desalination noting that the new water sources will not be operational for 10 years. The island nation, located 560 miles east of Madagascar in the middle of the Indian Ocean, has the dubious honor of being the former home of the Dodo bird. Perhaps the descendants of those that drove the Dodo to extinction can learn from the lessons of a changing environment.
