When a severe drought hit the Indian city of Kozhikode, formerly known as Calicut, in 2016, the residents, including student Svapnil Srivastav, had limited daily amounts of water available.
"We were entitled to two buckets of water a day, which we took from the tank," he says.
Although water supply problems are not uncommon in certain parts of India, it has been a difficult month for Srivastava and others in the area, he recalls.
"It was unbearable because it's a very wet area."
Srivastav was already interested in the problem of water scarcity after winning a student competition in 2012 about the future of water supply to cities, but the experience of a severe drought pushed him to research possible solutions.
"I was partly inspired by the device that turns air into water in the Star Wars film series.
“I thought why not give it a try?
"It was more of a curiosity venture."
A few years later, in 2019, that idea led him, Govind Balaji and Venkatesh Raja to found a startup company Uravu Labs, based in Bangalore.
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Their system turns air into water using atmospheric water generators that contain a desiccant, an agent that absorbs moisture from the air.
Using sunlight or renewable energy, the desiccant is heated to 65 degrees Celsius and releases moisture, which can then condense into drinking water.
Shrivastav says that the whole procedure takes about 12 hours.
Today, each unit produces about 2.000 liters of drinking water.
However, while his vision was to provide potable water to communities experiencing a shortage, he says it was not financially sustainable.
"We realized that it is necessary to make this technology popular and to reduce the price," says Srivastav.
"Or that someone finances it, but we didn't find support in India".
Instead, they currently have 40 customers in the hospitality industry who serve it as drinking water to their guests.
“We've tried with non-profit organizations and corporate social responsibility departments... but many companies shy away from the technology.
"They thought it wouldn't work.
"We had to turn to commercial consumption because those customers were ready to pay us, and that contributes to their sustainable development."
Water scarcity is not new, but many countries, especially in the Global South, are exposed to severe droughts and floods linked to climate change that pollute water sources.
More than 50 percent of the world's population - four billion people - face a water shortage at least once a month, and by 2025, 1,8 billion people are expected to live in countries or areas where there will be "absolute" water scarcity, they show. the data Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (UN).
Could the technology of producing water from the air be the solution?
It is energy efficient - it can be powered from renewable sources - it is one of the ways to provide a new source of water without the need to build a traditional infrastructure for water supply, which is why it is an attractive solution for remote places.
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There seems to be a market for this technology.
The value of the aerial water production market is estimated at $2022 billion in 3,4, and is expected to be worth $2032 billion in 13,5, according to the report market research companies Global Market Insights.
There are two main methods for producing water from air.
The first is the cooling and condensation process, which cools moist air and turns it into dew, which condenses the water vapor into liquid water.
Another system is desiccant-based and uses hygroscopic materials to absorb moisture from the air and then release it through a heating process, he says.
Beth Koji is the co-founder and CEO of a social enterprise Majik Water which has about 40 stormwater generators in arid and semi-arid areas across Kenya, which use cooling and condensation systems to harvest moisture from the air.
Koiji co-founded the company Majik Water in 2017 after she first experienced water shortages during the 2016 drought during her studies in Nairobi.
While many went to the nearby river to get water for cooking, drinking and washing, Koiji says she could not bring herself to drink the contaminated water.
"That's when I realized that people take water for granted because it's always there."
She began to think about other possible sources and founded a filtration company before developing a system for extracting water from the air.
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Majik Water works with non-governmental and humanitarian organizations, and the water it produces is also available in stores.
The company's largest plant produces 500 liters of water in 24 hours and is installed in schools and small communities.
Although there is a demand for her company's technology, Koiji believes that such a system is not a permanent solution.
"Honestly, I feel that this is not a solution to water scarcity," says Koiji.
"It's a temporary solution... mostly because it's not cheap."
Manufacturers are trying to create more energy-efficient systems for producing water from the air, says Avinash Singh, associate director of research and consulting at the company. Global Market Insights.
"For example, innovations in compressors, heat exchangers and desiccants have improved the energy efficiency of such systems."
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Government support, subsidies or environmental regulations could encourage the application of this technology, he believes.
One of the technological innovations that contributed to the application of such water production systems is the transition to digital payment.
The company Veragon, based in Italy, has water production facilities throughout the Middle East, Asia, Africa and South America.
"When we originally started working with off-grid communities, everything was based on cash payments which was not sustainable... today everything is digitized," says director of global operations Stephen White.
"For example, most of Cambodia is covered by the 4G network, and during the corona virus pandemic, the electronic wallet experienced a boom.
"There is a much better private infrastructure and partnership - the government doesn't have to be involved, and we sell water at a much lower price."
He says that all plants will be digitized in the next few months.
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However, such systems are not cheap.
Iz Veragona they say their units, which use a cooling and condensing system, cost between US$60.000 and US$70.000.
Koiji says their large unit costs $18.000.
However, Shrivastav points out that on-site water production costs less, because water is quite heavy and not easy to transport.
The company Uravu Labs investigates whether advances in materials science can improve the efficiency of desiccants, or whether using a different material that would absorb more moisture from the air would make the process more effective.
Srivastav says such innovations will also allow the required heating temperature to be reduced from 60 degrees to 40 degrees Celsius.
They also hope to launch pilot projects during which their systems will be deployed in data centers in India and Singapore.
Data centers generate a lot of heat that is usually wasted, but the company Uravu plans to use it to produce fresh water.
"This process will reduce fresh water consumption [in data centers] by up to 95 percent, because the company's system Uravu collects most of the waste heat and returns cold water, so very little make-up fresh water is required," says Srivastav.
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