A quick and cheap way to turn seawater into fresh water
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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To date, there are quite a few areas on the earth where there is an acute shortage of clean drinking water, in this connection, scientists from different countries are trying to develop an efficient and quick way of water purification. Most researchers are working on the process of converting seawater into fresh water, which not only would justify the costs, but was also convenient for remote rural regions.
Researchers at an Egyptian university in Alexandria have developed a new promising technology that makes salt water suitable for consumption in just a couple of minutes.
At the heart of the new method of Egyptian developers are special salt-retaining membranes, as well as the process of evaporation and condensation, which allows to clean dirty sea water and make it suitable not only for irrigation, but also for use in everyday life (drinking, cooking, etc.) .
Special membranes contain cellulose acetate powder, the cost of which in Egypt is relatively low. Together with the other components, the powder binds the ionic salts during the passage of water through the membranes. By its principle, the technology is a filter collecting salt, and releasing fresh clean water (all other existing filters filter microorganisms and solid particles).
This purification process is the first, in the second stage of this two-phase process, the heating of the resulting water begins to completely evaporate, and the resulting vapor condenses, which allows to get rid of the smallest impurities that could not be retained by the membranes, this is the final stage after which pure drinking water is collected.
The results of their work Egyptian researchers published in one of the scientific journals. At the same time, they noted that the technology created by them allows to purify water, in which there are several types of pollution. At its core, this method of purification is quite complex and requires a lot of effort and cost, but the new technology will allow thousands of people to get easy and quick access to clean water, suitable not only for irrigation, but also for consumption, while using sea water as a huge resource.
To create such a filter, cheap materials are required that are produced in Egypt, whereby the technology of water treatment justifies the costs and is available for mass distribution. Also, the advantage of this filtration is that there is no need to expend electricity during the purification process, so the method is of low cost and can be used even in remote areas where there are problems with electricity.
It is worth noting that today's deficit of fresh water is felt by 1/5 of the world's world population, especially in India, North Africa, and the Middle East. Scientists predict that in 30 years more than half of the world's population (about 5 billion) will face the problem of lack of fresh water, and more than 1 billion will not have access to clean water at all.
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