Company turns Dubai's desert air into drinking water

Even the desert can be a place for new forms of business. This is what has been demonstrated by the American company Zero Mass Water, based in Arizona and a plant in the Dubai desert from which they are transforming the vapour in the air into water. The water is then bottled and distributed to various customers. This technological solution is a real boon for the world's most arid regions. 

The company has a facility located 20 kilometres away from Dubai, in the village of Lehbab, which also has a camel-breeding and safari centre owned by the Dubai royal family, which is powered by renewable energy, unlike many of the desalination plants in the Emirates that consume fossil fuels. "The bottling plant is solar powered, the bottles we use are recyclable and the caps are sustainable," said Samiullah Khan, general manager of IBV, a company in the Emirates that will buy the water produced by Zero Mass Water.

The plant has over 1,250 hydroelectric panels, with an estimated value of around $2,500 per unit, although the plan is to have around 10,000 in the short term. The function of these panels will be to absorb water vapour and extract it with solar energy and produce up to five litres per day. The arid and humid climate of Dubai makes it a privileged location, according to Cody Friesen, founder of Zero Mass. 

Given the cost of production, bottled water will be sold at higher than normal prices, similar to those of the Evian or Fiji brands, which have a local price of 10 dirhams ($2.72) per litre. According to Khan the water will be sold in glass bottles to hotels and other bulk buyers. 

Technology could create an unparalleled breakthrough in the UAE's agricultural industry, though it is a bit premature to say that every drop is a small step, but it is also a giant leap in water availability, such a change in the country's landscape would require the use of sustainable amounts of water, and what better than water that is literally made from nothing. 
 

"The next thing is to really produce water to grow tomatoes and other things locally so we don't have those transportation costs and the money coming out of the economy to buy food," said Cody Friesen, founder of Zero Mass. However, it would require farming to be done in closed environments like warehouses. 

Gulf nations want to reduce their heavy dependence on food imports, especially with the coronavirus pandemic disrupting global supply chains. So this technology would offer the UAE a great deal of scope to strengthen its hydroponic agriculture, which is a method of growing plants that does not require soil, only solutions of nutrients dissolved in water. This technique is very favourable in desert areas because it eliminates the problem of relying on the soil to grow crops. Thus, in a region that seeks to minimize food imports, along with the technology to produce sustainable amounts of water, there is great scope for turning drylands into giant, non-traditional, eco-sustainable farming machines.

"Hydroponics is an excellent solution when looking for a sustainable method of growing vegetables at home," says Smitha Paresh of Greenoponics Agricultural Services, the UAE's specialists in soil-less and environmentally controlled cultivation techniques. "You save 60-70% of water when you use hydroponics," says, stating that the UAE, being an arid region, is a very suitable place for this method.

If you live in a desert, maintaining a fresh water supply is a challenge. One answer is desalination, but that requires a source of brine from which to extract the salt, which in turn requires the desert to be close to the sea. However, even in inland deserts, moisture is often present in the air in the form of water vapour. The problem is to extract this vapour effectively and cheaply. And that is what two groups of researchers - one at the University of Connecticut, the other at the University of California, Berkeley - have managed to do.

How easily water can be extracted from the air depends on the relative humidity of that air. Zero Mass is not going to rival bulk water processors in the short term. Initially, it will be able to produce up to 2.3 million litres per year, approximately the volume of a traditional Olympic swimming pool.