Solar Energy

A new cost-efficient and environmentally-friendly method of desalination that could use up to 80 per cent less energy has been developed by a team of Sydney researchers.

With an El Nino weather pattern expected to develop in Spring, possibly triggering droughts and bushfires, researchers from the UTS Centre for Technology in Water and Wastewater (CTWW) have developed an innovative way of desalinating water for irrigation.

Modern water purification methods exist that can easily get rid of water contaminants, even salt and bacteria, but some organic toxins and toxic metals, such as arsenic and hexavalent chromium need special processing [read: expensive and carbon-intensive] to be removed.