Elon Musk - can't he fix his countries water problem - but can send people 2 live on mars?

It seems that there are a lot of people who think Elon Musk is either a visionary and is going to help man colonize a new planet and then there are people who think he is a charlaton getting rich off of idiots and government subsidies. So for those who don't know, in Musk's home country there is a MAJOR drought going on for about 5 years and a city of about 2 million people are facing a dier situation where they are going to have to turn the water off for the whole city, that day is labeled "day zero". Now Cape town has had water issues in the past but since the new government has taken over about 20 years ago, it has gotten worse, infrastructure has crumbled and there has been almost no planning for the future (who would have thunk!)

So Cape Town is on the coast and has unlimited access to salt water. They also have a fair amount of coal in the country and little environmental controls to regulate pollution, so they could power a desalination plant with coal should they choose.


So what I want to know is why hasn't the savior of man kind, Elon, swooped in and saved his the city in his home country? If he can't make clean water with what is available there (and what the technology that can be purchased from other countries) then how in heck does he think he is going to be able to do it on Mars. Could it possibly be that there isn't enough money in it to make it worth while? Maybe South Africa knows he is a charlaton? Maybe he can't con the SA governement out of billions like he can in the US?

Really, why hasn't this man with the massive ego (I mean brain) come up with a breakthrough technology that would fix this world wide problem that is going to also be needed on mars?

Can anyone tell me one technology that Musk has developed and patented himself or has he just taken existing tech and repackaged it with the help of massive governement subsidies?

a reply to: NarcolepticBuddha

Well I addressed the topic so well see.

originally posted by: Sillyolme
a reply to: DigginFoTroof

Why hasn't trump fixed the water issue in Michigan with his own money? Why would a private citizen be responsible for that and not their government?
Why would you even think they should?

Exactly! Why hasn't the Gates Foundation done this? It's kind of what they do, but Silly is correct it's the government's responsibility to fix this issue. The problem with Cape Town is that they failed their people, not Musk. If anything Musk has shown the people of Cape Town that an easy fix to their issues there, is to just move away.

So instead of fixing a crisis in his own country, Musk decides that it is better to make fancy electric cars that are not enviornmentally friendly, they are only flashy toys that aren't economic in any way and has proved he can't meet production numbers or standards that he keeps promising.

Why can't he do something that would actually benefit people in his own country, put that big genius brain to use? So the answer is not to fix the problem, but to "run away" just like his plan to move to mars. Makes as much sense.

This is like someone trashing their house and looking next door to their neighbor who has a nice clean house and saying "I'm moving in with you". Instead of fixing the mess, just move and start the problem all over again.

There really needs to be some standards to which humanity holds themselves and those who don't live up need to put in situations where they learn what the real choices are and they can adapt and overcome or live in squalor and maybe die.

originally posted by: DigginFoTroof
So instead of fixing a crisis in his own country, Musk decides that it is better to make fancy electric cars that are not enviornmentally friendly, they are only flashy toys that aren't economic in any way and has proved he can't meet production numbers or standards that he keeps promising.

Why can't he do something that would actually benefit people in his own country, put that big genius brain to use? So the answer is not to fix the problem, but to "run away" just like his plan to move to mars. Makes as much sense.

This is like someone trashing their house and looking next door to their neighbor who has a nice clean house and saying "I'm moving in with you". Instead of fixing the mess, just move and start the problem all over again.

There really needs to be some standards to which humanity holds themselves and those who don't live up need to put in situations where they learn what the real choices are and they can adapt and overcome or live in squalor and maybe die.

Well put LOL!

Yeah how about solve earth problems instead of create all new ones by trying to colonize a planet with no protective magnetosphere to protect from radiation, where the soil is anti-microbial, no oxygen, no damned water (puh-lease) worth mentioning, no clear evidence it has EVER supported life, fake pyramids, and so on.

F Mars!

a reply to: DigginFoTroof

Ohhh com’on…


Why they “SHOULD”..?.. Why we all pay taxes for..? It’s their own “private money” and they should be allowed to do whatever they want/like to do with!



Again… who do we pay taxes to and for what..?

Elon Musk is scum, like the rest of these technophiles

a reply to: DigginFoTroof

I can understand the argument. It's his money. If he wants to spend it on toys. That's up to him.

I can understand your point in the OP.

It's not his fault there is a lack of water either.

But. He's not going to mars either.

No need for humans to go beyond the moon imo.

SA does not need to be saved.

It's a tract of land developed by colonists with no real basis of economic engine development. It's not making it is called the Free Market.

Move somewhere else.

Let´s say he did fixed your "water problems"
You would be saying why could he not have saved the starving children or curing cancer
One thing at the time.. and why should he have the know how to fix the water problems, his talents lies elsewhere.

Same question to the OP. Why doesn't Cape Town set up a desalinization plant itself? As you said they have the resources the technology to do so is common enough and they have cheap labor.


So why don't they save themselves? If the government there is too stupid or too corrupt to do it having a billionaire throw money at the problem will only increase the stupid corruption.

a reply to: DigginFoTroof

Our street could use some repairs and the local government won't pay for it, would you please pay for it for me? Come on you know you want to pay for it, even though it's not your responsibility and I have no right to tell you what to do with your money. Cough it up. Lead by example. $50,000 should do it and if you don't have it right now, take out a loan.

Being responsible for the infrastructure is not the governments responsibility and something no government should ever use taxes to pay for.

guardianlv.com...

i wouldent go back and help them ether

a reply to: DigginFoTroof

Musk decides that it is better to make fancy electric cars

Cars that can catch fire.

Here is the latest one.

www.bbc.co.uk...

a reply to: DigginFoTroof
Let's look at an article from a few years ago, and them ponder who should pay for what.

Business Tech 2 March 2016

Cape Town has 8,900 dollar millionaires, 390 multi-millionaires and 121 UHNWIs, the report said.

The you have these guys;

South Africa’s billionaires:

Christo Wiese

Nicky Oppenheimer

Johann Rupert

Koos Bekker

Patrice Motsepe

Stephen Saad

But hey go after a guy that actually is trying to change the world, and doesn't live there anymore, instead of these guys that do live in SA. Why not right?

The problem with many of the responses are that they are missing the big picture when it comes to the Musk analogy. Musk is a self promoting capitalists (his money source is questionable and I think he is a "chosen one" that people placed in a position to handle money raised from tech that HAD to be accepted - I don't think his success is all self generated and he had a lot of "inside" help and direction) who claims he is working to help save humanity, trying to reduce carbon emmisions and such.

Just looking at the cars he makes you can tell this enviornmentalism is total BS as if he really cared he would build cars with motors 1/4 - 1/6 the size like the make in India. He seems to think that the energy for the cars is carbon free and it doesn't take massive amounts of coal to power the plants that make the solar panels or wind turbines in china or the US. Or the coal/oil power plants in the US that make electricity for the cars. The emmissions are just moved from one place to another while claiming he is fixing the problem.

The big issue is that to have life on mars, they are going to need technology very similar to what is needed in Cape town, but much more advanced. Fixing the Cape town water issue should be an entry level problem compared to providing enough water on Mars to support life. It's like the difference between building a sand castle and building a sky scrapper (cape town is the sand castle & Mars is sky scrapper) in difficulty. If he wants people to really believe he can make the Mars thing a reality, then a good step would be to proving this in Cape town and make it a model for the world, as it is a MAJOR problem the world over. This isn't only about one medium size city in a country of questionable economic viability (under current governance) this is a problem of global proportions which is the true crisis facing the world, not whether we can build domes on Mars or reuse a rocket body, those are kind of far down on the list of major issues facing the world, yet he is hailed a savior for these somewhat trivial issues.

As far as the landing rockets, this is old tech as well. It was done in the mid 60's but from what I remember it wasn't cost efficient due to added weight and the RELATIVE cost of manufacturing other rocket bodies. With the advance of tech and especially 3D printing, rocket bodies could be manufactured in unique sizes with very little effort compared to means of the past and cost should be a fraction of what they have been previously making reuseable rockets kind of silly.

So, all of Musk's hoopla seems to be smoke and mirrors to build his ethos and ego as a means to extract more investment capital from people who don't see the whole picture.