Making Water Out of Thin Air?
By Joel Brown
Some 300 million to 500 million people in the world have no access to safe water at all, and perhaps 2 billion have inadequate access, “so it’s a big deal internationally,” says Greg Blonder, a College of Engineering visiting researcher and an ENG professor of the practice of mechanical engineering from 2015 to 2021.
One group of BU engineering students attempted to come up with an innovative way to address the crisis: creating a water harvester that would pull moisture from the air to provide potable water without great effort or expense.
“When we saw the numbers, that kind of hit home for us,” said team leader Gayatri Sundar Rajan (ENG’22). “One of the first things we have to do in this proposal is say why this is a problem, what is the scale, who would benefit. And the numbers are staggering.”
Besides Sundar Rajan, the team members were Tess Ravick (ENG’22), Carla Sheridan (ENG’22), and Trevor Melsheimer (ENG’22). The water harvester was their required ENG Senior Design Project, and for Sundar Rajan and Melsheimer, it was also their Keystone Project for Kilachand Honors College.
The team designed, built, and tested a water harvester that would use a desiccant to collect moisture from the air. The system would then heat up that water before cooling it down into liquid water.
But would their prototype work? Watch Devin Hahn’s video on BU Today to find out.
This story originally appeared on BU Today.