[PASSED] Regulating Desalination

[Ancient Greek Empire]

Regulating Desalination
Category: Environmental
Area of Effect: All Businesses - Mild

The World Assembly,

Observing that desalination is used by several member nations as a method of obtaining fresh water for their people;

Acknowledging that when used in an environmentally-safe manner, desalination is a very effective method for providing potable water to freshwater deficient member nations with access to saltwater;

Aware that improperly managed desalination can lead to irreversible environmental damage, such as release of highly concentrated pollutants into the environment or possible contamination of natural freshwater sources with salt;

Hoping to prevent these negative environmental impacts, while continuing to enable the use of desalination as a way to obtain potable water;

Hereby:

1. Defines, for the purposes of this resolution, "desalination" as the process of obtaining freshwater from saltwater through one or more purification methods;

2. Requires member nations to dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to any natural environment;

3. Encourages member nations to research and, when possible, utilize a combination of desalination and salt-recovery for industrial and commercial use;

4. Mandates that desalination plants and their operations must not cause irreversible damages to any ecosystem, and that effective environmental damage mitigation plans are in place to be enacted in the case of an accident;

5. Urges member nations with access to large quantities of saltwater to use desalination as a new source of water, instead of tapping into pristine freshwater reserves;

6. Encourages member nations to adopt energy-efficient strategies for desalination, and if possible, use renewable energy during the process of desalination;

7. Clarifies that nothing in this resolution discourages the use of other methods of alleviating water shortage, such as water use reduction policies.

Co-authored by ‪Kenmoria‬



As promised, Promotion of Desalination is here! Featuring Kenmoria as co-author.

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Archive

Promotion of Desalination

Category: Advancement of Industry
Area of Effect: Commercial Enterprise

The World Assembly,

Noting that many World Assembly nations might suffer from water scarcity;

Aware of the dangers that water shortage can provide the residents of such nations, for example dehydration and lack of available water for industrial uses;

Acknowledging that freshwater reserves in many nations are being depleted;

Believing that it is the duty of the World Assembly to preserving these freshwater reserves, which are natural habitats to many creatures;

Hoping that by promoting the use of desalination in nations, these problems can be solved;

Hereby:

Section One: Definitions

1. Defines the following, for the purpose of the resolution:

1. "desalination" as the process of purifying saline water obtained from saltwater reserves,
2. "thermal desalination" as the process of desalination through distillation,
3. "electrical desalination" as the process of desalination through reverse osmosis,

Section Two: Regulations

2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants;

Section Three: Promotion

4. Encourages member nations to use thermal desalination and/or electrical desalination as a source of water instead of importing water from overseas or tapping into freshwater reserves;

5. Encourages member nations to use the lowest amount of energy for desalination, and if possible, to use renewable energy;

6. Clarifies that this resolution does not discourage the use of other methods of solving water shortage, such as water reduction policies.

Co-authored by Kenmoria

Category: Environmental
Area of Effect: All Businesses - Mild

The World Assembly,

Noting that many World Assembly nations might suffer from water scarcity;

Aware of the dangers that water shortage can provide the residents of such nations, for example dehydration and lack of available water for industrial uses;

Acknowledging that freshwater reserves in many nations are being depleted;

Believing that it is the duty of the World Assembly to preserving these freshwater reserves, which are natural habitats to many creatures;

Hoping that by promoting the use of desalination in nations, these problems can be solved;

Hereby:

Section One: Definitions

1. Defines the following, for the purpose of the resolution:

1. "desalination" as the process of purifying saline water obtained from saltwater reserves,
2. "thermal desalination" as the process of desalination through distillation,
3. "electrical desalination" as the process of desalination through reverse osmosis,
4. "contaminants" as substances found in obtained saline water that are not suitable for sentient consumption,
5. "environmentally sensitive areas" as an area containing an ecosystem that could be severely damaged by any changes to the abiotic or biotic characteristics of the area,

Section Two: Regulations

2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants;

Section Three: Promotion

4. Encourages member nations to use thermal desalination and/or electrical desalination as a source of water instead of importing water from overseas or tapping into freshwater reserves;

5. Encourages member nations to minimise energy usage in desalination, and if possible, to use renewable energy;

6. Clarifies that this resolution does not discourage the use of other methods of solving water shortage, such as water reduction policies.

Co-authored by Kenmoria

Regulating Desalination

Category: Environmental
Area of Effect: All Businesses - Mild

The World Assembly,

Observing that desalination is used by several member nations as a source of water;

Acknowledging that desalination, if carried out correctly, is a method of obtaining water that should be encouraged amongst member nations with access to saline water;

Aware that improper use of desalination could lead to irreversible environmental damage, such as the improper disposal of toxic byproducts from saline water that could damage ecosystems, or the high energy usage which could result in a higher production of greenhouse gases;

Believing that the potential negative impact on the environment caused by improper use of desalination to be too severe to ignore, and as a result requires legislation in the form of a General Assembly resolution to prevent such damage;

Hereby:

1. Defines the following, for the purpose of this resolution:

* "desalination" as the process of purifying saline water obtained from saltwater reserves,

2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

3. Encourages member nations to research into combining desalination with salt-recovery for industrial and commercial use:

4. Mandates that desalination plants, their operation and waste products must not cause irreversible damages to the ecosystem, and that environmental damage mitigation plans are in place to be enacted in the case of an accident;
5. Encourages member nations with access to large quantities of saltwater to use desalination as a source of water, instead of tapping into freshwater reserves;

6. Encourages member nations to minimise energy usage in desalination, and, if possible, to use renewable energy;

7. Clarifies that nothing in this resolution discourages the use of other methods of alleviating water shortage, such as water reduction policies.

Co-authored by ‪Kenmoria

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[Tinhampton]

Boring technical suggestion - remove Articles 1b/1c and replace Article 4 with: Encourages member nations to use desalination through distillation and/or reverse osmosis as a source of water, as opposed to importing water or using domestic freshwater reserves; [...]

Boring-er miscellaneous suggestion: This is entitled "Promotion of Desalination" yet you have one clause on promoting desalination, one clause on efficient desalination and two clauses on requirements for safe desalination.

[Honeydewistania]

Boring technical suggestion - remove Articles 1b/1c and replace Article 4 with: Encourages member nations to use desalination through distillation and/or reverse osmosis as a source of water, as opposed to importing water or using domestic freshwater reserves; [...]

Boring-er miscellaneous suggestion: This is entitled "Promotion of Desalination" yet you have one clause on promoting desalination, one clause on efficient desalination and two clauses on requirements for safe desalination.

Promotion is more of the scope of the proposal.

[Agualia]

Hello all.
I would just like to say that this draft resolution is looking very good and deals with a very interesting and important topic. If I can help, please let me know.
Thank You All

[Solomons Land]

The regulations in this proposal are quite vague. You wrote: "2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

"3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants". The terms "significant degree/significant chance" and "environmentally-sensitive areas" are not defined, so these requirements essentially mean nothing, as nations can say that they mean whatever they want them to mean. Furthermore, other important terms, such as "sapient or sentient life" and "related contaminants" are not defined. The former two terms absolutely need to be defined, and it would be good to define others as well.

[Kenmoria]

The regulations in this proposal are quite vague. You wrote: "2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

"3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants". The terms "significant degree/significant chance" and "environmentally-sensitive areas" are not defined, so these requirements essentially mean nothing, as nations can say that they mean whatever they want them to mean. Furthermore, other important terms, such as "sapient or sentient life" and "related contaminants" are not defined. The former two terms absolutely need to be defined, and it would be good to define others as well.

“Defining ‘sapient or sentient life’ is plainly silly; the terms have been used hundreds of times before without definitions in past resolution. A member nation is also definitely capable of working out what ‘significant’ means without having us tell them. I do, however, accept the need for some clarification on ‘environmentally-sensitive areas’, and possibly ‘related contaminants’.”

[Solomons Land]

The regulations in this proposal are quite vague. You wrote: "2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

"3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants". The terms "significant degree/significant chance" and "environmentally-sensitive areas" are not defined, so these requirements essentially mean nothing, as nations can say that they mean whatever they want them to mean. Furthermore, other important terms, such as "sapient or sentient life" and "related contaminants" are not defined. The former two terms absolutely need to be defined, and it would be good to define others as well.

“Defining ‘sapient or sentient life’ is plainly silly; the terms have been used hundreds of times before without definitions in past resolution. A member nation is also definitely capable of working out what ‘significant’ means without having us tell them. I do, however, accept the need for some clarification on ‘environmentally-sensitive areas’, and possibly ‘related contaminants’.”

You can never define too many terms.

[Kenmoria]

“Defining ‘sapient or sentient life’ is plainly silly; the terms have been used hundreds of times before without definitions in past resolution. A member nation is also definitely capable of working out what ‘significant’ means without having us tell them. I do, however, accept the need for some clarification on ‘environmentally-sensitive areas’, and possibly ‘related contaminants’.”

You can never define too many terms.

(OOC: Although it is true that I like defining things, reasonable nation theory should mean that member states are capable of coming up with definitions themselves. Adding more definitions just adds needless length and complexity, as well has potential avenues for creative compliance if the definitions leave open obvious loopholes.)

[Solomons Land]

You can never define too many terms.

(OOC: Although it is true that I like defining things, reasonable nation theory should mean that member states are capable of coming up with definitions themselves. Adding more definitions just adds needless length and complexity, as well has potential avenues for creative compliance if the definitions leave open obvious loopholes.)

I still think you need to define at least "environmentally-sensitive areas".

[Kenmoria]

(OOC: Although it is true that I like defining things, reasonable nation theory should mean that member states are capable of coming up with definitions themselves. Adding more definitions just adds needless length and complexity, as well has potential avenues for creative compliance if the definitions leave open obvious loopholes.)

I still think you need to define at least "environmentally-sensitive areas".

(OOC: That one will be defined.)

[Araraukar]

OOC: Leave the currentmost draft visible, only spoiler old ones.

Also, I don't see any encouragement of commercialism or even industry here. The Advancement of Industry is basically anti-environmentalist category. You're adding environmental regulations instead of stripping them away, so this should probably be re-written as an environmental category proposal. Or social justice, if the point was to make safe drinking water accessible to everyone everywhere, not just the rich and privileged.

[Ancient Greek Empire]

New draft

[Tinhampton]

New draft

You have two Draft Ones now, do you? O_o

[Ancient Greek Empire]

New draft

You have two Draft Ones now, do you? O_o

No I don’t anymore

[Kenmoria]

You have two Draft Ones now, do you? O_o

No I don’t anymore

(OOC: Unspoiler the current draft.)

[Honeydewistania]

When u bump

[Honeydewistania]

If all is well, this could be submitted in one weeks time

[Araraukar]

OOC: Is there some reason why you're not posting the drafting threads with the account you intend to submit them with?

Also, there are some preamble claims that sound untrue considering the existing resolutions, and in any case have little to nothing to do with desalination, and you're missing an obvious one about irrigation and soil salinity that you could use, and given the very vague definition of environmentally sensitive areas, you've just banned desalination plants everywhere (because every single ecosystem fits the definition) that life exists.

There's some other stuff, but I can't English right now, sorry. I'll try to get back to you by Tuesday, but feel free to poke me with TG if I forget.

[Ancient Greek Empire]

OOC: Is there some reason why you're not posting the drafting threads with the account you intend to submit them with?

Also, there are some preamble claims that sound untrue considering the existing resolutions, and in any case have little to nothing to do with desalination, and you're missing an obvious one about irrigation and soil salinity that you could use, and given the very vague definition of environmentally sensitive areas, you've just banned desalination plants everywhere (because every single ecosystem fits the definition) that life exists.

There's some other stuff, but I can't English right now, sorry. I'll try to get back to you by Tuesday, but feel free to poke me with TG if I forget.

"We are unwilling to move out of our current region, although we don’t have any WA nations. If it bothers you this much, I could submit it with this nation."

"Also what claims are those?"

[Araraukar]

*snip*

OOC: The characters can't hear OOC stuff, your ambassador is talking to thin air.

[Honeydewistania]

*snip*

OOC: The characters can't hear OOC stuff, your ambassador is talking to thin air.

Alright then. I shall ask in OOC.

What claims are those?

[Maowi]

"If the purpose of clause 5 is to encourage energy efficiency, "use the lowest amount of energy" seems an odd way to phrase it ... maybe phrase it like so:"

5. Encourages member nations to minimise energy usage in desalination, and if possible, to use renewable energy;

[Honeydewistania]

"If the purpose of clause 5 is to encourage energy efficiency, "use the lowest amount of energy" seems an odd way to phrase it ... maybe phrase it like so:"

5. Encourages member nations to minimise energy usage in desalination, and if possible, to use renewable energy;

Thank you, it would be edited soon

[Araraukar]

OOC post.

The promised feedback. It's still Tuesday somewhere on this planet... *shifty eyes*

Believing that it is the duty of the World Assembly to preserving these freshwater reserves, which are natural habitats to many creatures;

This sounds like a random clause glued on top to make this sound more like an environmental proposal. You might want to consider removing this entirely and using my suggestions above instead.

Acknowledging that freshwater reserves in many nations are being depleted;

Clean Water Act: viewtopic.php?p=3123158#p3123158
Convention On Freshwater Shortages: viewtopic.php?p=34697391#p34697391
Preventing Groundwater Contamination: viewtopic.php?p=35370849#p35370849

Even with those in play? See more below.

Hoping that by promoting the use of desalination in nations, these problems can be solved;

And this is just silly. Desalination in RL is used mostly to get drinking water, it's not going to make a desert nation not a desert nation. Water scarcity most commonly happens because there's simply too many people (and thus industrial and agricultural needs) living in an area that naturally could not support that many people. Use of non-renewable (or very slowly renewed) groundwater is most commonly how the population and industry have swelled beyond sensible, and when such water reserves run out, problems happen. So normally water scarcity is a problem created by people.

However, the previously passed resolutions tackle the issue, requiring sources of freshwater (both above and belowground) to be protected from pollution and overuse, as well as requiring WA nations to preplan and adapt land and water use to what fits the environment, or else pipe in water from elsewhere - water purification (which desalination likely counts as) is already required to have been researched (by a WA committee if not the nations) and the information shared and applied as is possible.

So basically, yeah, you can set environmental regulations on one type of water purification to make sure it doesn't create additional problems, but in compliant WA nations (and trying to legislate on noncompliant ones is kinda silly) the whole water scarcity issue should already be managed, or at least in the process of being dealt with, and that is the base on top of which you ought to build your proposal.

You're not trying to solve a problem (water scarcity), you're trying to keep one of the solutions (desalination) from creating additional problems. I suggest a thorough rewrite of the preamble, focusing on pros and cons of desalination, and the possible problems that it can create if done improperly.

Section One: Definitions

These are useless.

1. Defines the following, for the purpose of the resolution:

Minor quibble, should likely be "for the purpose of this resolution".

"desalination" as the process of purifying saline water obtained from saltwater reserves,

1. "thermal desalination" as the process of desalination through distillation,
2. "electrical desalination" as the process of desalination through reverse osmosis,

I suggest leaving out the specific types of desalination, because you're for example ignoring the existence of freeze-thaw method entirely - not intentionally, I'm sure, but rather because you live in RL somewhere that the sea doesn't freeze most winters. So rather than trying to list all of them, go for guidelines on general desalination and let the nations themselves decide on which exact method to use.

"contaminants" as substances found in obtained saline water that are not suitable for sentient consumption,

Since you're using it in the dictionary definition, you don't need to define it.

"environmentally sensitive areas" as an area containing an ecosystem that could be severely damaged by any changes to the abiotic or biotic characteristics of the area,

Which fits every single ecosystem ever in existence. I honestly would leave this one undefined. Or use the rewrite suggestion below.

Section Two: Regulations

Unnecessary.

2. Mandates that member nations dispose of any waste products from the desalination process in a manner that does not pose a significant degree of threat to sapient or sentient life, or to the environments thereof;

You really need to talk about such waste products (brine) in the preamble, and why they're a bad thing (not just the high salt but also pollutant concentrations). You could add another clause encouraging or recommending (don't make it binding) WA nations to research possibilities of combining desalination with salt-recovery for industrial and culinary purposes, though. Two birds with the same stone.

3. Mandates that desalination plants are not built in environmentally-sensitive areas that have a significant chance to be adversely affected by these plants or related contaminants;

So rather than use the problematic definition that would make WA nations unable to build desalination plants anywhere that has life in it, you could simply use "Mandates that desalination plants, their operation and waste products must not cause irreversible damages to the ecosystem, and that environmental damage mitigation plans are in place to be enacted in the case of an accident," or something like that.

Section Three: Promotion

Unnecessary.

4. Encourages member nations to use thermal desalination and/or electrical desalination as a source of water instead of importing water from overseas or tapping into freshwater reserves;

This slightly runs counter of GA #107, where a WA committee is actually tasked to "assist in the creation of international water sharing schemes". Not a contradiction issue, but it just sounds silly that working systems (what's with the "from overseas", by the way? usually it's a pipeline from a neighbouring nation, not literally tanker ships from across a sea) set in place ages ago are now being recommended to be replaced by an environmentally damaging (unless also using salt recovery, the brine is environmentally damaging) system instead.

Not to mention even the insanity of encouraging nations that have no water scarcity issues, but would instead be pressed to find saltwater anywhere without importing it to not use what's readily available, and instead having to import saltwater to use. If you're keeping this clause at all, it should be reworded to fit nations that have access to plenty of saltwater, while struggling to maintain sustainable use of freshwater sources. Having just one or two clauses out of many, that do NOT apply to all member nations, does not make your proposal optional.

5. Encourages member nations to minimise energy usage in desalination, and if possible, to use renewable energy;

Think there's a comma missing after the "and".

6. Clarifies that nothing in this resolution does not discourages the use of other methods of solving alleviating water shortages, such as water use reduction policies.

Some edit suggestions.

[Ancient Greek Empire]

Draft Three up