Cleaning Up Water with the Power of a Tornado

Cleaning up Contaminated Water with the Power of a Tornado

Ambience: Tornado
A newly developed technology emulates one of nature’s most destructive forces as a means of providing clean water virtually anywhere. I’m Jim Metzner and this is the Pulse of the Planet. Right now we’re listening to the sounds of a tornado.

A device called the Tornadic One Pass was inspired the dynamics of a tornado. Air and contaminated water are pumped into a cylinder whose interior design creates a tornado-like vortex, vaporizing the water and removing waste products.

Sorber: This technology is so effective because it not only reduces metals and solids and dissolved solids, it takes out bacteria and pharmaceuticals out of the water at over 99% reduction in contaminants.

Karen Sorber is Chief Executive Officer and cofounder of Micronic Technologies.

Sorber: It turns out this technology is contaminant agnostic . doesn’t matter what you throw at it. It pretty much takes it out of the water, and it is scalable, so there’s infinite number of applications that it could be used for. In large cities, for example, there may be a major treatment plant that at the end of their “treatment train'” as they call it in the industry, there may be a highly concentrated brine that they want to get further reduced, before having to truck it off or resource recover, and we can handle that in time.

We’ll hear more on the Tornadic One Pass in future programs. Pulse of the Planet is made possible in part by the Center for Earth and Environmental Nanotechnology and the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.

Cleaning Up Water with the Power of a Tornado

One of nature's most destructive forces has inspired a new technology.
Air Date:01/14/2022
Scientist:
Transcript:

Cleaning up Contaminated Water with the Power of a Tornado Ambience: Tornado A newly developed technology emulates one of nature's most destructive forces as a means of providing clean water virtually anywhere. I'm Jim Metzner and this is the Pulse of the Planet. Right now we're listening to the sounds of a tornado. A device called the Tornadic One Pass was inspired the dynamics of a tornado. Air and contaminated water are pumped into a cylinder whose interior design creates a tornado-like vortex, vaporizing the water and removing waste products. Sorber: This technology is so effective because it not only reduces metals and solids and dissolved solids, it takes out bacteria and pharmaceuticals out of the water at over 99% reduction in contaminants. Karen Sorber is Chief Executive Officer and cofounder of Micronic Technologies. Sorber: It turns out this technology is contaminant agnostic . doesn't matter what you throw at it. It pretty much takes it out of the water, and it is scalable, so there's infinite number of applications that it could be used for. In large cities, for example, there may be a major treatment plant that at the end of their "treatment train'" as they call it in the industry, there may be a highly concentrated brine that they want to get further reduced, before having to truck it off or resource recover, and we can handle that in time. We'll hear more on the Tornadic One Pass in future programs. Pulse of the Planet is made possible in part by the Center for Earth and Environmental Nanotechnology and the National Science Foundation. I'm Jim Metzner.