My brainlet friend and I (also brainlet) were arguing about desalination to give cows drinking water and I figured out it would be pretty cheap to get enough propane to boil 56 litres of water which a cow would probably drink on a warm day. Just heat it up and condense it in a tube, whatevs. Apparently to get a cubic metre of water (1000 l) from desalination using plant methods costs 90 cents to 2 dollars. The water cost per kilolitre in a major Australian city is more than that. So why the fug is desslination considered so expensive? I understand membrane reverse osmosis is the preferred method in non shitholes but shouldn't that be even cheaper? Is it because it can't compete with exploiting preexisting fresh water sources for large scale water use and that's why? I have seen people say the problem is capital costs for making the desal plants - is that the whole story?