Collecting clean water directly from the air with a gel: a help to disadvantaged communities
Researchers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China, have developed a new hydrogel that improves the collection of water from the air, a press release said. The water harvester runs on solar energy and can be easily used in water-scarce areas.
The industrial-scale implementation of this solution can provide clean, fresh water to isolated communities in arid regions or on islands with little rainfall, providing significant relief to populations currently in difficulty.
The United Nations estimates that 3.5 million people die every year from water-related diseases, while 2.2 billion people live in countries with water problems. In this scenario, technology that can make water easily accessible is the need of the hour and researchers across the world are working to make it a reality.
Moisture capture using hydrogels is nothing new. In reality it was already known and exploited to keep electronic circuits dry, for example. There are different types of gels that work in this way, but, usually, given the high salt content, they tend to "stiffen" over time, especially in the presence of salt water, because the further addition of salts causes them to deteriorate. the structure making it rigid and therefore ineffective.
A new hygroscopic gel
Researchers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University synthesized their hygroscopic gel using plant derivatives. Used with hygroscopic salts, the gel, when dry, was able to absorb 2.60 pounds (1.18 kilograms) of water in arid environments and up to 14.1 pounds (6.4 kilograms) in humid environments.
“We were impressed that even when up to 5 grams of salt were injected into one gram of polymer, the resulting gel retained good swelling properties and even captured the salt,” said Ruzhu Wang, one of the researchers at the project, in the press release. The gel is not only inexpensive to synthesize, but its production can also be easily scaled up.
Furthermore, the team also tested a prototype desorption and condensation chamber. The use of a turbofan in the condensation chamber increased water recovery to 90%, which occurs thanks to the sun. The system worked equally well during the morning hours, when the sun is weak, and was able to facilitate absorption and desorption simultaneously during the day.
“This atmospheric water harvesting technology can be used to increase daily water needs, such as household drinking water, industrial water and personal hygiene water,” Wang added.
In addition to water production in arid areas, the hygroscopic material can also be used for dehumidification, agricultural irrigation and thermal management of electronic devices.
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The article Collecting clean water directly from the air with a gel: help for disadvantaged communities comes from Economic Scenarios .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/raccogliere-lacqua-pulita-direttamente-dallaria-con-un-gel-un-aiuto-alla-comunita-disagiate/ on Tue, 05 Dec 2023 17:01:45 +0000.