Future of Engineering

The water in Michael Pritchard's fishtank came straight from his garden pond and it showed. The greenish gunk looked and smelled like it ought not to go anywhere near a human digestive system. But after pumping it through his lightweight, handheld device it came out crystal clear and he even persuaded some onlookers to taste it. The Lifesaver bottle was one of several inventions at a show of military technology hosted by the National Army Museum in Chelsea recemtly.

Once a hurricane or earthquake hits, one of the most pressing logistical needs is to provide clean drinking water to the victims. A transport plane can typically hold enough bottled water for 800 people for a month. The same plane can carry 125,000 Lifesaver bottles. At one bottle per family, that's enough to keep half a million people in drinking water for 16 months. The bottle works by using a handheld pump mechanism to force water from the outside to the inside of a narrow coiled tube inside the device. The polymer that makes up the tube has pores in it that are 15 billionths of a metre in diameter - small enough to filter out bacteria and viruses

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Labels: Energy-Environment-Engineering, Society