GineersNow Engineering Magazine September 2016 Issue No 007

INDIAN SCIENTISTS
USE WASTE STEAM
TO PURIFY SEA
WATER
Necessity is indeed the mother
of invention. If it wasn’t for
the drought that hit 13 states
in India, this new way of
converting sea water to potable
water may not have been
devised by Indian scientists.
This new filtration process
produces 6.3 million liters of
potable water a day.
Water from the sea is being
processed by the pilot plant
at Tamil Nadu’s Kalpakkam,
which is built by scientists
of Bhabha Atomic Research
Center (BARC). They use waste
steam from a nuclear reactor to
purify the seawater. The center
also developed membranes to
filter uranium and arsenic from
groundwater.
Devices like a bicycle pedal with
a water purifier installed and a
household water purifier using
thin membranes and special
filters were also invented by the
group. Both turn contaminated
water into potable water.
KN Vyas, Director of BARC, said
that other plants have been
built in Punjab, West Bengal and
Rajasthan to cater to the water
needs of the people.
Photo by Quartz
Photo by ScottishRenewables
INVESTOR TRIES
TO HARNESS
ENERGY FROM
OCEAN WAVES
Photo by IndianNerve
Bhabha Atomic Research Center
Photo by NuclearWeaponArchive
Inventor and investor Adam
Norris is looking to solve
one of the most difficult
problems in the field of
renewable energy. He wants
to harness power from ocean
waves. Everyone knows
the overpowering strength
of the sea, but harnessing
that energy is down-right
difficult. No one in the world
has been able to create a
commercially viable wavepower
business, and many
of these companies have
died trying.
Norris set up a company of
his own, called Wavepower
Ltd, and hired people to work
for him. He says he’s in it for
the long haul. When he was
asked how much energy will
we be producing from waves
by 2020, he said “None. I
don’t think by 2020 there’ll
be anything meaningful out
of the wave industry,”
But hopefully in a year or
two after that, the sector will
be reaching its tipping point.
“I think in five to six years we
could be producing electricity
[that is] commercially
meaningful.” He said.
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SEPTEMBER 2016
Clean Water Technologies