As the global water crisis grows direr, scientists are looking to all manner of alternative water sources to hydrate people and sustain economies. Some methods for growing the world’s drinking water supply involve tapping into existent freshwater sources. Others, such as desalination and atmospheric water generation, involve generating new freshwater from other natural resources.

Desalination, in particular, has been of scientific interest for decades. However, its use is limited, because desalination might not properly stand up to a challenge as vast as the global water crisis.

What is desalination?

Desalination is the removal of salt from ocean water and brackish water (which is a mix of ocean water and freshwater) to make it usable for human needs. Since a whopping 97.5 percent of the earth’s water is saltwater, the notion of a process through which saltwater can be converted to freshwater is immensely appealing. As the global water crisis depletes reservoirs around the world, the world’s oceans, among other saltwater sources, could be a good water resource if treated properly.

Despite its potential for combating the global water crisis, desalination is not a common water generation method. Although desalination is prevalent in the Middle East -- especially in Israel, where 40 percent of the country’s water comes from desalination -- in the U.S., it’s not used much outside California, which is one of the country’s most drought-prone states. 

Why is desalination not widely adopted?

1. Desalination is too expensive: Many desalination plants around the world rely on energy-intensive filtration processes such as reverse osmosis to convert saltwater to freshwater. Desalination plants thus quickly become expensive to run and maintain.

2. Desalination requires tremendous up-front investment: The initial installation of the high-tech pumps and post-treatment facilities that comprise a desalination plant can cost hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars. In Santa Barbara, California, a desalination plant was shut down for being too expensive to run -- and later, when local authorities chose to reopen the plant, they spent $50 million to restart and maintain the plant.

3. Desalination can harm the environment. Among the process’ byproducts are brine, a substance of high salinity. This brine often returns to the earth’s water sources, and when it does so without proper mixing, it can contaminate these sources and kill marine organisms. These organisms can also be killed when the saltwater they live in is brought into desalination plants.

4. Desalinated water lacks ample magnesium. The desalination process has been shown to strip water of magnesium, an element vital for human health. Studies have correlated the lack of magnesium in desalinated water with increased death rates among cardiac patients. Since 40 percent of Israel’s water comes from desalination, the government is considering mandating the addition of magnesium to municipal water.

The alternatives to desalination

Desalination is far from perfect, so scientists have developed strong alternatives for water purification. Some of these methods rely not on generating new water, but on recycling freshwater that’s already been used for other purposes. Greywater, which includes the water used in dishwashers, washing machines, sinks, and showers, can be reused many times, thereby decreasing the need for access to pure water.

Other alternatives for turning existent natural resources into drinking water include atmospheric water generation (AWG) machines. In-home and outdoor AWG machines convert the moisture in the air to water. Air is an unlimited resource, so AWG presents no environmental burden. However, modern AWG machines generate only small amounts of water and contain no filters or other in-built purification methods.

How Oxydus makes AWG a viable alternative to desalination

At Oxydus, we’ve improved on the promise of AWG by bringing it into factories where we regulate temperature and humidity levels to achieve maximum water output. When we draw air into our factories to begin the AWG process, we pass it through state-of-the-art filters before we even begin converting it to water. Once the water is generated, we pass it through another series of filters before bolstering it with government-mandated minerals. Our factories generate 10,000 liters of clean drinking water every day, and we distribute this water in fully biodegradable bottles to the communities most in need.

A challenge as dire as the global water crisis calls for forward-thinking solutions, and at Oxydus, we believe our AWG factory is exactly that. Click here to visit the Oxydus Wefunder page and learn how you can contribute to a permanent infrastructure that could help to provide clean water for all.