특허 대기 중인 간접 해수 담수화 기술이 작은 자기장을 통해 담수화 처리된 물을 생산할 수 있는 것으로 드러났다.

오스틴(Austin)에 위치한 텍사스 주립 대학과 독일의 마르버크 대학의 화학자들이 개발한 이 기술은 작은 전압(3.0 볼트)가 장착된 플라스틱 칩을 해수에 가득 채워 놓는 것을 통해 담수화를 진행시킨다.

연구팀은 아직 25%의 담수화율 만을 달성하였지만 그들은 99%의 담수화율 달성이 절대 불가능하지 않다고 말한다.

다음 이들이 직면한 과제는 기술을 확장시키는 것이다. 현재 사용되는 인간의 머리카락 한올 크기의 마이크로채널은 일분에 40 나노리터의 담수 밖에 생산하지 못하기 때문이다.

A patent pending technology using a mediated seawater desalination process could produce desalinated water using a small electrical field.

Researched by chemists at The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Marburg in Germany, the process works by applying a small voltage (3.0 volts) to a plastic chip filled with seawater.

Although the research teams have only achieved a 25% desalination rate, they believe that a 99% desalination rate is “not beyond our reach??.

The other major challenge is to scale up the process. Currently the microchannels, about the size of a human hair, produce about 40 nanoliters of desalted water per minute.

The chip contains a microchannel with two branches. At the junction of the channel an embedded electrode neutralizes some of the chloride ions in seawater to create an “ion depletion zone?? that increases the local electric field compared with the rest of the channel.

This change in the electric field is said to be sufficient enough to redirect salts into one branch, allowing desalinated water to pass through the other branch.

In layman’s terms, the process has been described like a ??troll at the foot of the bridge??, with the ion depletion zone preventing salt from passing through, resulting in the production of freshwater.

The research team was led by Richard Crooks of The University of Texas at Austin and Ulrich Tallarek of the University of Marburg. It’s patent-pending and is in commercial development by start-up company, Okeanos Technologies.

Tony Frudakis, founder and CEO of Okeanos Technologies, said the technology could eventually be used in disaster relief.

“Okeanos has even contemplated building a small system that would look like a Coke machine and would operate in a standalone fashion to produce enough water for a small village,?? he said.

[출처: Waterworld / 2013년 7월 10일]