Water in the desert is far from common, and it is not surprising that we even have a saying “as rare as water in the desert.” Still, with modern technology, we are not that helpless anymore. For over a decade now, the fog catchers have been used to collect water from vapours found in the deserts. Just because it is invisible, doesn’t mean it isn’t there – water collected from the atmosphere is a precious source for the local population and the plants as well.

How does this work? The fog catchers are essentially vertical panels of polyethylene mesh. They collect water from fog and channel it to storage tanks. This simple and yet innovative technology can ensure a higher quality of life in many communities located in desert areas. In some of these areas, the fog catchers can collect as much as 600 gallons of water in one day! It is a dramatic difference, and one that frees poor people from outrageously high water prices.

Still, installing the panels into dry regions all over the world takes time, dedication and funding. One such initiative was started in year 2000 by a small Canadian non-profit organisation called FogQuest. As a charity that helps small rural communities in developing countries, they have so far established projects in Ethiopia, Guatemala, Nepal, Chile, Eritrea and Morocco.

In recent years, Fog Catchers are becoming more and more common, bringing hope and making life in desert areas less difficult. We hope that this initiative will flourish even more with time, improving the quality of human life, improving the irrigation for the flora and ensuring that future won’t bring a complete lack of water reserve in some places.

At the end, we would also like to mention that fog catchers aren’t the only technology used for collecting water from the atmosphere. Atmospheric water generators are another approach which uses technology to collect water from the air.

Improving access to clean drinking water has been a goal of global development groups and charities for decades. Yet today, roughly forty percent of the world’s population still lacks access to clean water, and more people have a cell phone to play video poker on than they have a toilet. This causes a high incidence of disease and mortality, especially in children.

Over the years, many different solutions to the clean water crisis have been proposed. Some were too expensive, some too impractical, and some simply too difficult to put into place logistically in areas with little to no existing infrastructure.

Enter the LifeStraw. This simple-looking little device is cheap, user-friendly, and long-lasting. It can remove 99 percent of bacteria and parasites, as well as chunks of dirt and debris down to 0.2 microns. The straw uses a series of chemical-free filters to achieve this effect, which will last through 1000 liters of water. All you have to do is put the straw in water and drink.
LifeStraw helps address problems that most water treatment systems fail to solve. For example, helping a village build a well provided clean water source, but when villagers transport that clean water in dirty jugs, they once again become exposed to disease risks. Because the LifeStraw can be used to drink clean water directly from a dirty source, it eliminates the problem of finding clean transport vessels. Also, unlike a well or a piped water system, LifeStraw enables people to carry the ability to get clean water with them wherever they go. This is very important given the unfortunate abundance of refugee situations in the world today.

If you’re interested in charitable giving to support the world’s quest for clean water, consider LifeStraw.

Water has always been an important part of the global policy agenda, owing to its necessity as survival tool. The growing trend towards rapid urbanisation that has occurred over the last few decades, however, has led to water increasingly becoming a resource which is at the core of sustainable development thinking.

On October 31, 2011, the Population Division of the United Nations declared that the world is now inhabited by over 7 billion people. Of these 7 billion, over half live in cities, with this figure expected to increase to more than 70% by 2050. The rapid growth of city population size, and density, is putting much undue stress on water resources, resulting in the United Nations emphasising the need to rethink city development, not as an objective in itself, but instead as a means of delivering a sustainable resource management solution.

At the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, Rio+20, held in June 2012, the UN concluded that, “We stress the need to adopt measures to significantly reduce water pollution and increase water quality, significantly improve wastewater treatment and water efficiency and reduce water losses. In order to achieve this, we stress the need for international assistance and cooperation.”

With water resource management firmly fixed on the international agenda, technological innovations are likely to be at the forefront of solving the water shortage problem. Smart meters, for example, which are to be piloted in Malta, allow for the optimisation of water and electricity consumption through loss reduction, remote management and real time consumption analysis.

The future of effective sustainable development may be unclear, but, one thing is for certain, water is finally being recognised as one of the resources at its very core. We’re just waiting for actions to happen! In the meantime we’re taking another look at irouletteonline.com to perfect our strategy!