The Financial Potential Of Salty Water And Ocean Water

Farming with salty water is nothing new. There are farmers who combine non-salty water with salty water to have more water for their crops. In fact, there are YouTube videos which shows farmers attesting that they have better crop yields due to salty water.

Here is just one video titled: SALTWATER - A Texas farm's future hangs in the balance. which shows this. And as I have said, this technology or discovery is not new. It has been around for some time already.

Currently, there are many farmers in the world who are suffering because of drought. For example, the continuing decades long drought in California have affected farmers to such an extent that they are actually cutting back on farming because there’s not enough water.

Although not all plants would thrive well with salty water, there are some who do. Corn for example can thrive on salty water. Unfortunately, corn is not generally considered a high value crop.

Here is an old video from the Voice Of America or VOA which reported about nearly a decade ago the results of an experiment by a group of European scientists regarding combining fresh water with salty water.

The YouTube video is titled: Farming With Salty Water Is Possible. The research done by these European scientists proved to be a success. They were able to grow carrots, cabbage, onions, beetroots and potatoes.

The experiment yielded smaller crops that were better tasting and much nutritious than similar crops watered with conventional fresh water. In fact, the potatoes watered with salty water proved not only to be the most resilient one but also the most fruitful.

This is essentially good news for anyone involved in the farming of potatoes for they are one of the most consumed vegetables in the world. In fact, a lot of fast food companies rely on them for sales.

So we can conclude that salty water can viably be used for watering crops. But the real question is this: Why aren’t more crops being watered with salty water? Is there something inherently problematic with using salty water to water crops?

The main problem with using salty water to water crops is that not many crops and even plants can tolerate them. This means that if a farmer overuses salty water for their crops, they can end up killing their crops.

And this might be the reason why not many farmers are using salty water: many farmers still fear using it. Of course the solution is education but not many farmers are what we call modern farmers who really study crop growing on a regular basis.

An overwhelming number of farmers are not like the ones we see on television showing western farmers with their huge tracts of farms being planted and watered with huge and modern farming machines.

Many of the worlds farmers have small tracks of land which they plant and irrigate using old technologies and sometimes a small farm machine which may be decades old. It is not uncommon to still see farmers from developing countries still use work animals like bulls.

This is the reason why many modern farming technologies like the use of salty water has not grown even though the technology is already decades old and even longer. Not many people know about it and its benefits.

I reference an article from the website of Science Daily titled: Easter Island inhabitants collected freshwater from the ocean's edge in order to survive- Process of 'coastal groundwater discharge' made water safe to drink for ancient people of Rapa Nui.

It is an interesting read and I suggest that you fully read the article to conclude for yourself if indeed salty water or ocean water can be mixed with fresh water to have more drinking water supplies.

But in summary, the scientists stated that the inhabitants of the island collected water where the little fresh water in the island mixes with ocean water thus enabling them to have more supplies of drinking water.

Of course its not as simple as drinking a combination of salty water and fresh water. The scientists also reported that the natives have also an almost salt free diet because they know there is already too much salt in the water they use in preparing their food.

But we can imagine the potential of this knowledge if it was applied today to many drought stricken places in the world especially in the African continent and the Middle East. Even a small increase in drinking water supply thanks to salty water would be very helpful.

At the moment, only a few farmers who are experiencing severe fresh water shortage are using salty water. But what if salty water or even ocean water can be sold not as a source of drinking water but as water for non-drinking purposes?

I know it sounds silly but can’t we use salt water to wash our homes, furnishings and dishes for example? What if we can use salty water or ocean water to flush our toilets? Just think how much this would alleviate our problem with fresh water shortage.

Though I don’t predict that we would have separate taps for our freshwater and salty water anytime soon or even in the foreseeable future, it’s still nice to dream of a future where we are not wasting precious drinking freshwater just to flush our toilets.

But what if it can be done on a small scale? What if a coastal community near the ocean have dual plumbing for both fresh water and salty water? I can already anticipate that this is no small venture but a big one considering that installing plumbing for a community is very expensive.

But what if the community has a port. A port is directly in the water and plumbing for it would not be that expensive. Then once the port plumbing connection is already profitable, additional plumbing can be connected to structures near the port until it reaches the community.

Because ocean water and salty water are both rich in other kinds of mineral salts such as sodium and iodine, it is considered an antiseptic. This means that it has many wound-healing properties.

An antiseptic is a substance that stops or slows down the growth of microorganisms. In fact, ocean water and salty water has been used since almost the beginning of time to treat wounds.

It is in essence a natural disinfectant. A disinfectant is the term used for liquids used to destroy bacteria. Ocean water can also be combined with other chemicals to create Chlorine Bleach.

Chlorine bleach is used industrially and commercially to remove color from fabrics or fibers. It is also used to remove or clean the stains in fabrics, hence the term “bleaching.” Global News Wire reports that the global chlorine market would be worth US$ 4.2 billion by 2030.

Imagine if you bottle ocean water or just salty water in plastic buckets and sell it as all natural disinfectant. I’m sure that if you market it correctly, there would be buyers since many people today are interested in buying all-natural products as compared to processed products.

What I see as a big potential market for ocean water and even salty water would be in terms of hair care. A lot of people today are now beauty and health conscious. A lot of people now spend good money on healthcare products which includes haircare related products.

But is ocean water really beneficial for one’s hair? Numerous articles online point to the benefits of bathing your hair in ocean water. Simply typing for example the Google keywords: ”is ocean water good for hair” would bring out a lot of articles attesting to it.

A lot of these articles like to point out that ocean water contains nutrients that help hair stay healthy. Magnesium and Potassium for example which are found in ocean water keep the pH (alkalinity or acidity) of your scalp in check.

A good marketer can sell ocean water as a hair cleanser and rejuvenator. All the marketer has to do is to point at the numerous articles online (including medical and scientific) articles that point out to the medical benefits of ocean water.

But can someone actually pull this off? I can point out that bottled water is just plain tap water sold by clever companies with big marketing budgets. If clever marketing people can do it to bottled water, I have no doubt that they can also do it with ocean water and salty water.

Salty water has a lot of uses. One of its most important uses is in farming where a small but growing number of farmers have been using it to water their crops to produce much better yields.

But salty water and ocean water can also be used for cleaning and even as a drinking water to a point. But I see the greatest potential of salty water and ocean water in the disinfectant and healthcare industry. Salty water and ocean water can be a profitable product to sell.

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