Living on a cruising yacht you must ALWAYS conserve Water, fuel and electricity, your life depends on it. Si Bon has two freshwater tanks with a capacity of about 175 gallons total. In order to be able to cruise for extended periods (more than just to Dana Point), I have a watermaker onboard which will turn saltwater into freshwater, my watermaker is a Spectra 150 Ventura Deluxe (whew), which has a rated output of 6 gallons of freshwater per hour. One of the BIG advantages that the spectra has over other watermakers is a very low AMP usage, remember that you MUST also conserve electricity, so you can make all the water in the world, but if in doing so you use up all of your electricity/fuel you're screwed. Sunday before the kids came over I made 5 gallons of freshwater in about 45 minutes...not bad, seems like I might be getting a little more than the rated output. I also have a water tester which allows me to monitor the quality of the water I'm making.....here's where it gets a little scary for the folks in San Diego city water district, before leaving my land based house I tested my water from SD water district, it had a "parts per million' (PPM) of 474, the EPA says that anything over 500 PPM is "not fit for human consumption", Si Bon's water on Sunday tested at 140 PPM....anyone want to come by for a glass of water?
One BIG question that comes to mind is...if I, on a relatively small sailboat, can turn saltwater into freshwater without a whole lot of trouble...why is the state of California not able to do it??????