water and water filtration

The six ideas below my signature are all important and worth your additional research ... unclean water kills more people worldwide than anything else! Rotary International has made this a priority to provide clean water sources worldwide and save lives. Any ideas that can be implemented to provide healthy water are very worthwhile.

 

A few months ago I sent out a concept for water purification worth repeating:

"New Nanotech Purifier Filters Water 80,000 Times Faster

by Cameron Scott

A new water filter that employs cotton dipped in nano-sized silver wires and copper tubes works 80,000 times faster than filters that simply block bacteria from getting through. The filter, developed by Stanford University researchers for use in developing countries, efficiently conducts a tiny charge of electricity, zapping 98 percent of all bacteria.

 Photo: Shai Kessel

Millions of people die in rural and undeveloped areas every year from exposure to contaminated drinking water. The challenge is to create processes that work cheaply and reliably and uses materials that are light enough to transport. The pass-through filter is less likely to fail due to clogging or becoming infested with the bacteria it’s intended to kill: if bacteria cling to it, the silver kills them. And because its nano-materials are especially efficient conductors of electricity, the filter can get the jolt it needs from a small solar panel, a hand crank or 12-volt car batteries.
Unfortunately, when it comes to drinking water, 98 percent isn’t an adequate kill rate, so water would have to be filtered more than once. But since the filter works 80,000 times faster, there’s plenty of time for that."
Thanks and pass it on,

Mike

 

Mike Fowler

P.O. Box 400

108 West Live Oak Street

Hutto, Texas 78634

512-736-2000 cell

512-759-2000 home

mfowler16@austin.rr.com

Top 6 Life-Saving Designs for Clean Drinking Water

by Bridgette Meinhold

Almost a billion people lack access to clean drinking water, which is the result of low water supplies and poor sanitation systems around the world. This shocking figure underscores the importance of affordable designs that filter water to make it safe enough to drink, as well as systems that improve sanitation for communities. In honor of this year's Blog Action Day, we've rounded up six innovative design solutions that provide clean drinking water - granted that one in eight people in the world don't have access to water, it's designs like these that help save lives.

 

 

Water has been prevailing theme this last year, especially in the wake of multiple natural disasters that involved polluting our oceans, flooding and access to clean water. Not only is it the stuff that makes the world go round, but every person needs access to clean drinking water and a number of designers around the world have been working to produce life-saving devices and designs that can filter or provide clean water for the world.
Architectural projects like this community toilet facility for India would go a long way to improving local water quality, sanitation and reducing disease. NGOs and governments should help invest in water filtration devices to disperse among families in third world countries. And we also need to crack down on business and factories polluting our rivers, lakes and oceans.

LifeStraw Water Purifier

The LifeStraw is a plastic cigar-sized water filter that purifies water by removing potential pathogens like typhoid, cholera, dysentery as well as the parasites. It works as soon as you suck up water from a source, rendering up to 1,000 liters of water fit to drink without electricity or additional attachments.

Play Pump Merry Go-Round Water Pump

Since kids always seem to be bustling with extra energy, why not put that energy to good use. The Play Pump Merry Go-Round was designed as a fun water pump for rural villages and schools in Sub-Saharan Africa. Kids can have fun while providing water for use in cooking, sanitation, drinking, and even growing food. So far over 1,000 pumps have been installed, and PlayPumps International hopes to increase that number to 4,000 by the end of 2010.

LifeSaver Water Filter

The LifeSaver bottle is a personal water filtration device that uses various filters to screen out even the smallest viruses as well as bacteria, contaminants, and pathogens. Over the course of the filter's life it can clean 4,000 liters of water, and it can filter 750 mL of water in less than a minute. The filter isn't cheap, however hopefully economies of scale and research and design will produce more affordable options in the future.

Ceramic Water Filters

This simple yet ingenious design for providing Cambodia with ceramic water filters won the 2008 Project Innovation Award Grand Prize. The design consists of a porous ceramic and fired clay pot that sits inside a barrel, collecting water and then relying on gravity filtration to remove microbes and other contaminants. Since 2002, when these filters were first distributed, the regions with the filters are reporting a 50% drop in diarrheal illnesses.

Life Sack

The Life Sack is a double-duty design that first is used as a grain sack for food transport, and once delivered it can be used to store and filter water. The Life Sack uses SODIS (Solar Water Disinfection Process) technology to purify contaminated water using UV-A radiation. On top of that, the sack can be worn as a backpack for easy transport.

Pitch:Africa

Pitch: Africa is a creative idea that use a soccer field (or pitch) to collect and filter rainwater. The field and accompanying stands, which seat up to 1,000, are permeable and collect rainwater in cisterns, estimated to be 1.8 million liters for many parts of Africa. That water can then be purified for drinking or used to irrigate nearby crops.