{ "model": { "rank": 6794, "code": "thing-q190873", "model_id": "vr.tr.desalination", "name": "desalination", "purpose": "Let an agent explain desalination technologies and how they work, describe applications and notable facilities with sources, present energy, cost and environmental considerations with attribution, and support water policy and engineering questions at a general level.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Activities and processes", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "ACT", "domain": "ACT.PRC", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q190873/", "tier": 2, "score": 58, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "Multiple-effect humidification", "Solar desalination", "desalination facilities", "desalination in Israel", "Geothermal desalination", "Low-temperature thermal desalination", "Solar humidification" ], "aliasCount": 7, "merged": 7, "knownIn": 58, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": "vr.tr.desalination", "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q190873", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q190873", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-12T03:00:56Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 2, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q190873", "registryId": "vr.tr.desalination", "name": "desalination", "version": "0.2.0-wave.2", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "ACT.PRC" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q190873/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.desalination", "name": "desalination", "purpose": "Let an agent explain desalination technologies and how they work, describe applications and notable facilities with sources, present energy, cost and environmental considerations with attribution, and support water policy and engineering questions at a general level.", "definition": "A separation process that removes salts and minerals from seawater or brackish water to produce fresh water for drinking, agriculture and industry, by membrane methods such as reverse osmosis and by thermal methods such as multi-stage flash, multiple-effect distillation and humidification, with variants powered by solar, geothermal or low-temperature heat; desalination is used at scale in water-scarce regions such as the Middle East, Israel, Australia and California, with considerations of energy use, cost and brine disposal.", "what_it_is_for": "Producing fresh water from saline water.", "affordances": [ "explain technologies", "describe applications and facilities", "present considerations", "support policy questions" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Salt removal", "Energy intensity", "Brine by-product", "Scale from household to city" ], "appearance": "Plants with membrane racks or thermal units, intakes and outfalls.", "visual_identification": [ "Removes salt from water", "Membrane or thermal", "Water treatment removes contaminants but not necessarily salt; softening removes hardness" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "reverse osmosis", "multi-stage flash and multiple-effect distillation", "humidification and low-temperature thermal methods", "solar and geothermal desalination", "brackish water and small-scale desalination" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "separation process", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "extraction", "why": "another separation process entry" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "water storage", "why": "storage of produced water" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "electrical grid", "why": "energy supply for plants" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Drinking water quality standards", "Environmental permits for intakes and brine discharge", "Energy and water policy frameworks" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "High energy use and emissions", "Brine impacts on marine environments", "Membrane fouling and plant failure" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "How desalination works.", "rationale": "Engineering.", "layers": [ { "id": "membrane", "name": "Membrane", "description": "Membrane methods.", "findings": [ { "id": "membrane-finding", "name": "Membrane", "description": "Membrane.", "questions": [ { "text": "How does reverse osmosis remove salt, and what pretreatment and energy recovery are involved?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits membranes?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "thermal", "name": "Thermal", "description": "Thermal methods.", "findings": [ { "id": "thermal-finding", "name": "Thermal", "description": "Thermal.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do multi-stage flash, multiple-effect distillation and humidification methods work, and where are they used?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits a specific method?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "apply", "name": "Apply", "description": "Applications.", "rationale": "Practice.", "layers": [ { "id": "facilities", "name": "Facilities", "description": "Facilities and regions.", "findings": [ { "id": "facilities-finding", "name": "Facilities", "description": "Facilities.", "questions": [ { "text": "Where is desalination used at scale, and which facilities are notable, according to sources?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits a specific facility?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "small", "name": "Small", "description": "Small-scale and renewable.", "findings": [ { "id": "small-finding", "name": "Small", "description": "Small.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do solar, geothermal and small-scale desalination systems work, and where are they appropriate?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is professional engineering assessment needed?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "assess", "name": "Assess", "description": "Considerations.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "energy", "name": "Energy", "description": "Energy and cost.", "findings": [ { "id": "energy-finding", "name": "Energy", "description": "Energy.", "questions": [ { "text": "How much energy and cost does desalination require, and how do these compare with alternatives, according to studies?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which findings are contested?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "environment", "name": "Environment", "description": "Environmental effects.", "findings": [ { "id": "environment-finding", "name": "Environment", "description": "Environment.", "questions": [ { "text": "What are the effects of intakes and brine discharge, and how are they mitigated, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation neutral?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "learn", "name": "Learn", "description": "History and policy.", "rationale": "Education.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How did desalination develop from shipboard stills to modern plants?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "policy", "name": "Policy", "description": "Water policy.", "findings": [ { "id": "policy-finding", "name": "Policy", "description": "Policy.", "questions": [ { "text": "How does desalination fit into water security policy and debates?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which misconceptions arise?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should each technology be a separate entry?", "How should facility registers be linked?", "How should environmental assessments be linked?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "abstract concept", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a desalination, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain desalination technologies and how they work, describe applications and notable facilities with sources, present energy, cost and environmental considerations with attribution, and support water policy and engineering questions at a general level.", "characteristics": { "substance": "activity", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: Multiple-effect humidification, Solar desalination, desalination facilities, desalination in Israel, Geothermal desalination, Low-temperature thermal desalination, Solar humidification.", "7 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 58 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a desalination, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "something that happens over time", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. What is recognised is an instance of it, and which instances count is exactly what is argued about." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "Multiple-effect humidification", "Solar desalination", "desalination facilities", "desalination in Israel", "Geothermal desalination", "Low-temperature thermal desalination", "Solar humidification" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 58 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 7 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one desalination from another, and a desalination from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a desalination sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a desalination from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a desalination passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a desalination between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a desalination, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a desalination is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "process-and-outcome", "name": "Process, inputs and outcome", "description": "How a desalination proceeds, what it needs and what it leaves behind.", "rationale": "An activity is known by its steps and its results, and both have to be recordable while it is still running.", "layers": [ { "id": "steps-and-sequence", "name": "Steps and sequence", "description": "The steps of a desalination, their order and what may run in parallel.", "findings": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions", "name": "Steps, preconditions and completion", "description": "What has to be true before each step of a desalination and what marks it done.", "questions": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a step of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a step of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a step of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-results", "name": "Inputs, resources and results", "description": "What a desalination consumes and what it produces.", "findings": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs", "name": "Inputs, outputs and side effects", "description": "The resources a desalination takes and the results it leaves, wanted or not.", "questions": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the inputs and results of a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the inputs and results of a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the inputs and results of a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "definitions-in-contest", "name": "Definitions and who holds them", "description": "What desalination is taken to mean, and by whom.", "rationale": "When a field disagrees about a concept, the disagreement is the content. A model that picks one definition silently destroys the information.", "layers": [ { "id": "competing-definitions", "name": "Competing definitions", "description": "The main readings and the traditions behind them.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-map", "name": "Definitions and their holders", "description": "Each definition with the school or body that holds it.", "questions": [ { "id": "definition-map-q01", "text": "Which definitions of desalination are in use, and which tradition or body holds each?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "definition-map-q02", "text": "What turns on the difference between them in practice?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "operationalisation", "name": "Operationalisation", "description": "How it is measured or applied when it has to be.", "findings": [ { "id": "operational-record", "name": "Measures and proxies", "description": "Instruments and indicators used to stand in for it.", "questions": [ { "id": "operational-record-q01", "text": "How is desalination operationalised or measured in practice, and by what instrument?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "id": "operational-record-q02", "text": "What does that operationalisation leave out, and when does that matter?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "instances-and-use", "name": "Instances, use and consequence", "description": "What counts as an instance of desalination and what follows from calling something that.", "rationale": "Applying a concept is an act with consequences, so a model must say what the label licenses and what it does not.", "layers": [ { "id": "instances", "name": "What counts as an instance", "description": "Clear cases, borderline cases and non-cases.", "findings": [ { "id": "instance-tests", "name": "Tests for an instance", "description": "What would settle whether something falls under it.", "questions": [ { "id": "instance-tests-q01", "text": "What would settle whether something is an instance of desalination?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "instance-tests-q02", "text": "Which borderline cases are argued about, and on what grounds?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consequence", "name": "Consequence of application", "description": "Rights, duties or decisions that follow from the label.", "findings": [ { "id": "consequence-record", "name": "What the label licenses", "description": "What an agent may do once something is classified this way.", "questions": [ { "id": "consequence-record-q01", "text": "What follows practically once something is treated as desalination?", "kind": "action" }, { "id": "consequence-record-q02", "text": "What must an agent not infer from the label alone?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a desalination came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a desalination and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a desalination is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a desalination, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a desalination, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a desalination is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }