Water from air: How atmospheric water generators

How many times have said that clean, usable water is the basis of all life on Earth and every year becoming more and more rare. That soon the war will unfold not because of oil and other minerals, and it was because of her birthmark?.. Already, approximately one person in five has difficulties with shortage of drinking water. And even the townspeople, accustomed to comfort provided by the modern systems of water supply, it is not necessary to forget about it.





As it said on the geography lessons? "A large part of the Earth's surface is covered by water..." And this is about 326 million cubic miles of water. 97% of them are salt from the seas and oceans and only 3% is fresh. But part of 99,3% are in the form of ice, and half of what remains, under the ground.

By 2025, nine billion people on the planet will share all the same quantity of water available. Most of them will live in large overpopulated cities, exerting enormous pressure on local water resources. And if you remember that urban water supply has to constantly repair, mend and renew, the future seem quite so black and unenviable.

So where do we get clean water? The air contains, according to various estimates, from 12 to 16 thousand km3 of water (or 0,000012% of all water on Earth). This volume can be compared with the amount of water in the Great lakes of North America (the largest natural reservoir of fresh water in the world).

Meanwhile, many of even the poorest and most densely populated countries in the world the air is so humid and Tay that the water could be condensing right out of him.

Cubic meter of air contains (depending on humidity) from 4 to 25 grams of water vapor. Existing installations can collect on average about 20-30% of this amount. The best conditions for them (high humidity and temperature) – in countries within 30 degrees latitude of the equator.

As nature constantly replenishes the stocks of water in the air, the device producing the valuable liquid from the air, nothing can harm the environment (even if they will be established very much in a particular place). It turns out, the process can go on forever and the hardware is only limited by their lifespan.

Talk about how atmospheric water generators (AWG – Atmospheric water generator). The first system to supply water from the air, were developed in the 1990s.

In fact, they were similar to the system used for dehydration of the air in the refrigerator (still can remember the rain from under the air conditioning in the modern metropolis). The compressor forces the refrigerant to pass through the maze of tubes at the same time a fan blows over the tubes the air. If the temperature of the cooling coils below the dew point, approximately 40% of the fluid from the air will condense on them, draining in a special container. If the tubes are too cold, the surface will be formed ice (which, of course, will affect the phone's functionality).

But in the fridge, and generators of water from the atmosphere, there are also special air filters, UV sterilizers and activated carbon filters for collected way, devices, enriching it with oxygen, water level sensors in the container.

Optimal parameters of operation: temperature above 15.5°C and a relative humidity (RH) above 40%, but also not too high altitude above sea level (not above 1200 meters). Although most of the instructions refers to 20-40 °C and RH of 60-100%.

It is clear that the installation of these generators implies the existence of the air inlet outside of the room. There's a bunch of factors: surprisingly, atmospheric air is much cleaner "home" and "office" is already dried with air conditioning. And to collect moisture from the room harmful: people already suffer from low humidity. Although the smallest installation with good ventilation you can put in the kitchen or in the bathroom.

Where could use a dehydrator? We started with the desert – there it will be useful to the inhabitants of distant settlements, for which the transportation of bottled water roads or impossible, the military, leading the fighting away from water sources, and representatives of humanitarian and rescue missions (including doctors).

AWG can be used for domestic and agricultural use in offices, schools, hotels, on ships, making cruise travel, sports centres and other public places. For commercial purposes, some manufacturers even offer the option of bottling water from the air in the bottle!

Now try to tell about the main products on the market of production of water from air.

Element four

The main product of the company called Element four Water mill (WaterMill).

It collects up to 12 liters of water per day for various household needs and has a nice design. The owners don't have to worry about the presence of collected liquid toxins and bacteria. Special system care about the cost of the device as low as possible amount of energy (and soon the installation will be to connect to alternative sources of energy). On a special screen displays information about temperature, relative humidity and amount of moisture.





Prices on WaterMill will be announced in early 2009, it all began in 2004 when Jonathan Ritchie and Rick Howard decided to create my own generator water from air. At first they worked in a canadian research company, Freedom Water, but in 2008 was rebranded, and that's Element Four released their first product.

AirWater Corporation

This company was formed in February 2003 after a corporate solution, Universal Communication Systems (UCSY) to begin work in the field of high technologies for extracting water from air. However, various scientific studies she spent more than 13 years, during which a patented technological solutions.

AirWater Corporation specializiruetsya at facilities supplying water in an amount of from 100 to 5000 liters per day. However, the dimensions of these devices are appropriate. There is even a special mobile units that supply drinking water to the army units in the field.

In the Arsenal of this company are mobile devices and those that simultaneously make ice. Air Water Corporation already exist solutions for irrigation and remote areas in which their product can run from solar panels (by the way, this company makes them, too).

The larger (and comparable) generators water from atmospheric air are also produced by White Buffalo Nation and Aqua Sciences.

Air2Water





The device was developed by company Air2Water, give from 3 to 38 gallons of water per day, that is, are not so large.

The principle of operation of these machines corresponds to all the rest, although there are some differences: at first, the air passes electrostatic filters that retain about 93% of the suspended particles. The condensed water is lighting the UV lamp for 30 minutes (at this stage, dies 99.9% of germs and bacteria, and then the precipitate is separated, the coal is delayed about filters 99.9% of harmful volatile organic compounds, and a microporous membrane separates the viruses. But that's not all – every hour the water in the container again treated with ultraviolet light. The main production is concentrated in China and Singapore, although the shipping is done worldwide.

Aquair





Aquair American subsidiary of RG Global Lifestyles, born in 2004, Her Forte, perhaps, is that in addition to just sucking moisture out of the air she specializiruetsya more and drinking water treatment. The result is a five-stage filter installation diagram shown on the previous page).

By the way, on the website of the company can find a calculator that allows to estimate water consumption for different needs throughout the year.

Other companies

Australian firm AirtoH2O also makes water from the air and is proud to have collected more than 360 thousand litres of water (as publicly reported on the website). Its products are almost indistinguishable from other such small producers: China Water Master and located in Texas Aqua Maker.
We will add that on the price of a liter of water obtained from any of the installations, is uncertain. However, all manufacturers claim that they have low energy costs, and the cost per liter is estimated to be from 1 to 15 Amer. cents.

In General, the count of such values is a tricky business, because the cost of a liter of the precious liquid depends on the capacity of the generator (annual water yield), as well as humidity and air temperature for his Board.
Note also that there are alternative methods of obtaining water from air. So, one of the methods based on intensive absorption of atmospheric moisture liquid lithium chloride. The resulting mixture then passes through several polupronicaema membranes due to the effect of reverse osmosis, whereby water is separated from the lithium salt.

The main conclusions are as follows: the direction is definitely promising and almost harmless for the environment. However, it is unlikely any of the existing companies will be able to solve the world problem of lack of clean drinking water. Partly due to the fact that big enough yet manufacturers of the water from the air. In addition, citizens of the developed countries is not so easy to teach them to value natural resources, while poor countries hardly can afford to provide all its residents with a convenient and simple source of water in the form of the described generators. published

 

P. S. And remember, only by changing their consumption — together we change the world! ©

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Source: ddugroup.ua/press/publications/news-714.php