THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, June 3, 1995 TAG: 9506020004
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Short : 31 lines
Virginia Beach and Tampa, Fla., have something in common. Both need water.
Tampa, with a population of more than 3 million, needs more water or in the 21st century it will be out of water.
Tampa's solution is to go north into other counties and tap into their wells, which doesn't sit well with these counties.
The other solution is desalinization. Tampa is now studying this possibility. It has found that ``desal'' costs more than taking water from the ground. ``Desal'' could cost as much as $8 for every 1,000 gallons of water. Groundwater costs about $1 per 1,000 gallons.
But by building a desalinization plant beside a power plant that has all the electricity it needs, the cost could drop to $3.50 per 1,000 gallons.
Virginia Beach would still rather pursue the destructive idea of running longer pipes to Lake Gaston.
Key West has a ``desal'' plant but it is used only in emergencies. Virginia Beach should study this other source before it has to.
THOMAS SINGCO
Norfolk, May 22, 1995 by CNB