View Single Post
  #17  
Old 03-01-2009, 07:29 AM
Littlearmies Littlearmies is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 108
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b
Oh, that's easy! It's from Star Wars Episode 6...
Actually its from the Romans - they said that a guy who was in love (or lust) was "salted up" ("salax" in Latin) and salacious stems from salax. I find stuff like that fascinating so I'm really enjoying the book.

In the UK Cheshire is the centre of salt mining (actually it's often that you drill down and take the brine from the well - it's why salt drilling was the precursor technology for the oil industry, that and the fact that salt domes are an indicator for oil - you then reduce the brine to below 24% salt solution at which time salt crystals begin to precipitate). In the US it used to be Onondaga in upstate NY, Kanawha in the South.

Using evaporation in large tanks is a slower technology but if you have an area with a good climate (south end of San Francisco Bay) it's quite possible. Otherwise you need to build some basic technology, in a coastal area with fuel and transport links.

My view of the Twilight World is that, blessed with the knowledge of how to do things but not the equipment (or energy) to do them on a modern large scale, we would revert to 18th and 19th Century methods of production at least at first.
Reply With Quote