Drought solution? A invention from MIT and Jain Irrigation Systems can turn salt water into clean drinking water using solar energy. Photo credit: Shutterstock

Thanks to EcoWatch for this good news:

MIT’s Solar-Powered Desalination Machine Could Help Drought-Stricken Communities

Lorraine Chow

A team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Jain Irrigation Systems have come up with a method of turning brackish water into drinking water using renewable energy. With parts of the planet running dangerously low on fresh water, this technology can’t come soon enough.

This solar-powered machine is able to pull salt out of water and further disinfect the water with ultraviolet rays, making it suitable for irrigation and drinking. As the MIT News Office explained, “Electrodialysis works by passing a stream of water between two electrodes with opposite charges. Because the salt dissolved in water consists of positive and negative ions, the electrodes pull the ions out of the water, leaving fresher water at the center of the flow. A series of membranes separate the freshwater stream from increasingly salty ones.”

Called a “photovoltaic-powered electrodialysis reversal system,” the technology recently won the top $140,000 Desal Prize from the U.S. Department of Interior (USID) that recognizes innovators who create cost-effective, energy efficient and environmentally sustainable desalination technologies that can provide potable water for humans and water for crops in developing countries, the USID announced.

The USID said that the MIT-Jain system is designed for low-energy consumption and helps reduce costs for underdeveloped areas that do not have easy access to electricity. “By 2050, global water demand is expected to increase by 55 percent, and 70 percent of global water use occurs in food production,” said Christian Holmes, USAID’s Global Water Coordinator, in a statement. “The Desal Prize was developed to supply catalytic funding to capture and support the innovative ideas and new technologies that could have a significant impact.”

Jain Irrigation Systems noted that with this technology, water recovery is above 90 percent and the 5-10 percent reject concentrate is dried in a solar pond without creating any environmental hazard. It also removes hardness as well as salts and chemicals, pesticides, fertilizers as well as micro-organisms.

“This technology has the potential to bring agriculture to vast barren lands using brackish water,” said Richard Restuccia, Jain’s vice president of Landscape Solutions…

Read the whole story here.