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XPrize's New Challenge: Turn Air Into Water, Make More Than a Million Dollars (cnet.com)
An anonymous reader shares a CNET report: If you can turn thin air into water, there may be more than $1 million in it for you. XPrize, which creates challenges that pit the brightest minds against one another, is hoping to set off a wave of new innovations in clean water -- and women's safety too. The company announced its Water Abundance XPrize and the Anu & Naveen Jain Women's Safety XPrize on Monday in New Delhi. The first competition will award $1.75 million to any team that can create a device able to produce at least 2,000 liters of water a day from the atmosphere, using completely renewable energy, for at most 2 cents a liter. Teams have up to two years to complete the challenge. India is at the center of the world's water crisis, with access to groundwater depleted in some northern and eastern parts of the country. Water has become so scarce in India that natural arsenic has infiltrated the soil and water in certain regions. While there are systems that can currently extract water from the atmosphere, many of them aren't energy-efficient, or generating enough water. "We know that overuse of groundwater resources are causing the water crisis and it's only getting worse," said Zenia Tata, XPrize's executive director of Global Expansion. The $1 million Women's Safety XPrize calls for an emergency alert system that women can use, even if they don't have access to their phones. The alert would have to be sent automatically and inconspicuously to emergency responders, within 90 seconds, at a cost of $40 or less a year. The device would have to work even in cases where there's no cellphone signal or internet access.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_well_(condenser)
I guess we'll also need a droid that understands the binary language of moisture vaporators.
Better solution: Have fewer babies.
PM me for an address to which to send that $1M.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The next X-Prize will be "Turn water into wine".
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki...
It's a little over 83 liter of water per hour, presuming this is meant to be running 24 hours a day. So I'm going to guess this is meant to generate enough water for more than a single family. Maybe a good portion of a village. The details are light in the linked article. What's the target area's relative & absolute humidity and the season? Is it even possible for certain areas of the world to do that?
We already have this device, although it will cost you a bit more than $40...
It's called a gun....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I'm I missing something or this have already been done? There's even a Billboard that filter the humidity in air to make drinkable water : http://bigthink.com/design-for...
Elok
Refrigerant based dehumidifiers produce about 2 liters per kilowatt hour (at least in a somewhat damp basement -- probably less efficient in drier areas). So that would be over 40 megawatts of continuous input needed to get 2000 liters per day. Or, at 10 cents per kilowatt hour, $100 of electricity per day to reach that target. Or about 5 cents per liter -- not too far off from the 2 cents needed, and it can be renewable if powered off wind or solar. But then you need to factor the capitalized cost of the equipment in -- a dehumidifier is about $100.00 or so, with a 5 year write off that works out to be 1/10 penny per liter. Not sure how much the solar panels will cost to run it though.
Getting water out of the air is easy.
The hard part is dealing with Sandpeople. They will steal your car, your droids... hell, even your wife.
The hardest part of this XPrize will be finding an interpreter who understands the binary language of moisture vaporators.
Or about 5 cents per liter -- not too far off from the 2 cents needed
Thanks for doing some quick math, but "not far" is not how I would describe the challenge... It is not an order of magnitude (10x) of improvement, but even taking your numbers that still means the new device has to be over twice as efficient in a humid area and probably closer to 4 times as efficient in a much less humid area.
Very similar to vapirators in most respects.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
Maybe I'm not thinking this thing through, but do we really have so much extra air that we can start willy-nilly turning it into water?
And wouldn't a better solution be to just start turning people into Soylent Green?
You are welcome on my lawn.
This has already kinda been done using the hydrogen internal combusion engine. Not only will it create water from hydrogen and oxygen, it'll do work at the same time. The problem here is that the hydrogen can't just be plucked out of the atmosphere because it's so light it escapes, so you have to figure out where that's going to come from. You could buy it, but then you're not getting it from air.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
The problem with "free hydrogen" is that it floats. You start to see it about 70km up, and even then it is extremely rare because it is so light that it can get knocked out of Earth's gravitational well pretty easily by our solar wind.
So no, just burning "free" hydrogen just floating around in the atmosphere isn't possible. Good thing too, or else the atmosphere on our planet would be pretty much Hindenburg-like, which would make for a very crispy planet every time there was lightning storm.
Cool. We're all gonna suffocate. At least we won't be thirsty
There's $1.75 million on the line, so instead of posting anonymously to Slashdot you should get to work.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
$44k + $6k fudge factor. I could easiy do it for less than $50k assuming a semi-humid environment. Or a flooded laundry room.
Note that's an off the shelf solution, I'd bet tht this could be reduced by 20% with a more targeted design (no inverters in the system and dc motors in the dehumidifiers)..
"but actually turning free hydrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere into water."
What planet are they from?
Jupiter? Saturn?
Or the next planet out after that
I
Does Frank Herbert have a patent on this idea?
Am I the only one who thinks that anyone who can make a device that pulls "2,000 liters of water a day from the atmosphere, using completely renewable energy, for at most 2 cents a liter" would be far, far better to patent the machine and then sell it themselves? The device they are describing would be so miraculous - not to mention useful - that the $2 million prize would be small change to what the inventors would get if they commercialized it.
I mean, I'm all for encouraging scientists and don't think that science should only be about making money, but for what they are describing, they really ought to be offering a /real/ prize rather than what would be comparative pocket-change to the device's actual value.
I mean, I read that the cost of desalinization in California costs ~$10,000 per person (and that's just for the cost of the building plant, not the power or the distribution); to desalinate enough water for the whole state would cost close to $400 billion dollars. A machine that could create water for 5 people (2000 liters is a little more than 500 gallons; Americans use about 100 gallons of water a day) for $40 a day would have municipalities breaking down the inventor's door. XPrize really should offer remuneration that reflects the importance and value of the invention.
> Interesting since they want cops to have a monopoly on firearms while they accuse them of racism and abuse.
Nice burn...
So, can you finance the purchase of a Glock and a few boxes of ammo for $40 per year?
Have gnu, will travel.
What do you do with all the heat? And wouldn't you need a very large volume of air?
Water vapor is the most abundant greenhouse gas
Reading just the Slash Dot part (not the original article), it seems that India has a shortage of water so now they want to take it from the air. Well... fine. But that will dry out the air and if done to excess, will change the weather and ultimately, less rain fall will come down in other areas (or perhaps even the same area) of the water extraction plants. It just seems like a classic robbing Peter to pay Paul scenario.
Why not build something similar to those things they have on boats that you set off if you get stuck out at sea and need rescuing? Something that, when activated, sends a unique identifier (to identify who's device was set off) to a satellite along with some GPS coordinates.
There is nothing magical about a Personal Locator Beacon (this one was highly reviewed. I am not getting kickbacks. I am not getting referrals. I do not own one.) The $300 buy-in price translates to less than $40/year if it lasts ten years, which it might.
On the other hand, it would be totally fucking useless even if it sent a ping straight to your local PD saying you were being raped, because by the time they show up, it will be over.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
how cool is this
http://waterseer.org/
Go well
TFA gives the example of India running out of ground water. The reason for this is that India provides FREE ELECTRICITY to farmers, giving them no incentive whatsoever to conserve. So they run their pumps 24/7, over watering their fields and depleting aquifers. Ending these idiotic subsidies would do far more good than wasting even more power to condense humidity out of the air.
It would be better for both farmers, the environment, and the Indian economy to replace power subsidies with unconditional money transfers. Then the farmers could decide for themselves what to spend the money on: possibly electricity, but more likely efficient pumps, drought tolerant seeds, fertilizer, etc. Power and water waste would decline, crop yields would improve, and rural incomes would rise.
The reason for this is that India provides FREE ELECTRICITY to farmers, giving them no incentive whatsoever to conserve.
Just between us Chachalacas, one might think, just possibly, mayb kinda sorta.....
They have too many fucking people!
But don't worry, there is no problem at all, because Godwin is always wrong.
That's the thing, Earth can accomodate an infinity of people. Removing enough Oxygen to make water to hand to a few billion people forever is just about the smartest idea ever.
But here is the thing. does India or any other country have the right to remove huge amounts of Oxygen from the atmosphere?
The women's safety prize is a good idea, but India's male attitude toward women is the real problem. In a country where rape is caused by unclothed or scantily clad mannequins inciting lust in males, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new..., firearms might be a better thing for women to carry.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
> Interesting since they want cops to have a monopoly on firearms while they accuse them of racism and abuse.
Nice burn...
And lit the Strawman on fire.
But of course, we live in a country where a background check is considered calling a a ban on all guns according to some friends.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
I bet if we started stamping out fresh versions of the Liberator pistol, we could get 'em under $40 a pop. Actually, I just checked. In 1941 each liberator cost $2.10 to produce, according to Wikipedia. That's $34.49 in today's money, according to the inflation calculator at http://www.usinflationcalculat... So who's got a prize for George Hyde or his descendants?
Let's help make it a bit clearer. Let's say you're the average US male height, weight and build - 176cm / 59" and 83kg/184lbs and a bench press of 165lbs. Picture an environment where everywhere you go, you're surrounded by men who average 192cm (64"), 105kg (231lbs) - with the weight difference being primarily muscle - with a bench press of 400lbs. On average. Basically, the average person around you is a NFL linebacker. Now picture that a good number of them are sexually attracted to you. That they're much more likely to be involved in violent crime than you. That a disturbingly high percentage of your friends and family have been molested or raped by them. Perhaps you yourself.
Try to understand the difference in what the world is like for others.
"99 dead duelists of Dios on the wall. 99 dead duelists of Dios! Take one's ring, pass it around..."
Over a few decades... sure.
The "inconspicuousness requirement" might make that more like three or four decades.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Step 1 go up to Home Depot.
) Step 2 buy a length of hose for $10
Step 3 connect one to each of the hundreds of millions of air conditions that dot the planets.
Step 4 collect the condensation instead of letting it run down the drain.
Use said water for toilet flushing, growing crops etc.
I get 5-10 gallons a day off my AC during the summer. It probably averages out to 2 gallons a day for the whole year.
That would be 200 million gallons of water per day or 73 Billion gallons per year assuming my 2 gallons a day as the average multiplied by 100,000,000 homes. sized air conditioners globally. 1 Billion dollars to retrofit 100million air conditioners. The hoses would last 10 years.
Price per gallon. 1.4 cents per gallon
Oh wait they wanted in Liters. ok. That would be 0.36 cents per Liter. 5.5 time under what they wanted.
Pay up bitches.
California has a similar problem. Farming eats up the bulk of their water usage but they sell water to the farmers anywhere from 1/10 to 1/4 the price that they charge people in the cities. Then they wonder why the farmers are growing dumb ass things such as rice in the desert. Hint rice doesn't grow in the fucking desert.
Israel has been doing an excellent job of it. And India has more landmass directly adjacent to the ocean.
https://www.scientificamerican...
If the X-Prize folk searched "atmospheric water generator", they would find multiple commercial products that run on electricity. Then, they would simply need to set up a solar panel system, and they'd be done.
I live in a desert, and have looked into getting one of these systems. The (commercial) system I'm looking at has a cost that would meet their guidelines for production and cost, provided a working life of about 20 years. That's... not unreasonable.
Why don't we all use this technology? Because I'm billed for water (in the desert, in a drought) at $0.0015 per liter. If I'm really wasting water, and I get a fine for over-use, then I'm punished with a rate of $0.0036 per liter. If the cost for atmospheric water condensing was $0.02 (the X-Prize target), it still wouldn't be cheaper than aqueducts hundreds of miles long or ocean desalination (the two sources of my water). If they're going to have a cost target, it should be a lot lower. Really, they should be looking for creative ways to scale and capitalize the existing systems. We don't need more technology here, just different financing models.
Note that it uses 7A max (measured), so 0.84kw on maximum setting and about 60l/day.
make the phone go into wifi hotspot mode where the ssid is an asymmetrically encrypted string that is recognized only by phones nearby running the same App, which try to connect to the internet themselves, or do the same thing ..
Or an emergency wifi network maybe ?
Not moisture from air, but actually turning free hydrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere into water.
Isn't that called a fuel cell?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Good thing too, or else the atmosphere on our planet would be pretty much Hindenburg-like, which would make for a very crispy planet every time there was lightning storm.
Only once, I suppose.
Turning humidity into drinking Water at suitable rate/quantity is a) completely impractical, and b) ignores the real issue of water treatment.
Here is a case in point
The more you watch that video, the more you'll realise how unrealistic it is to turn humidity into water. The video covers a specific case, but the generalities are true enough for any approach (e.g. conservation of energy)
Also, as pointed out in the video, most people (and animals) gravitate to and settle near a supply of water (even in arid climates), the problem is however: making/keeping that water clean, safe and drinkable. Please solve that!
Why waste time turning air into water when we already have the holy grail of turning air into alcohol?
https://www.sciencedaily.com/r...
You realize almost 50% of India doesn't even have electricity, right?
I heard stillsuits are efficient enough to allow someone to survive in a desert.
Right. Keep denying our reality.
"99 dead duelists of Dios on the wall. 99 dead duelists of Dios! Take one's ring, pass it around..."
The issue is presented as being a lack of any (dirty or clean) water being available. A solar still just purifies/desalinates existing liquid water. What they want is something that condenses water out of the air.
That is big news. Someone needs to tell the UN and all their little SJW, tree hugger buddies about it.
You know though an extra 73 Billion gallons per year in the first world will have an impact on the 3rd. The tech for water capture will be made cheaper and make it's way into the 3rd. The extra food and manufacturing that will come with a drop in the price of water will result in more goods and services which too will find its way into the 3rd.
You don't make people's lives better by showing up with a tanker truck full of water. You make it easier for them to get water on their own and they will.