17 December 2008
Universities Collaborate to Improve Water Quality in China
Inexpensive arsenic removal process uses “people power,” not electricity
Littleton, Colorado — More than a million people in rural areas of Chinese Inner Mongolia suffer serious health problems from drinking water containing arsenic levels up to 180 times those set in international health guidelines.
Students at the University of Pittsburgh are partnering with Tsinghua University and the Shenyang Institute of Environmental Sciences in China to design and implement low-cost treatment to remove arsenic effectively from wells, using naturally occurring iron available inexpensively in Inner Mongolia.
Their work is supported in part by a grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in its People, Prosperity and the Planet (P3) national design competition. (See “U.S. College Students Offer Innovations in Global Sustainability.)
“We are excited that this project could potentially save the lives and health of many in Inner Mongolia,” Di Gao, University of Pittsburgh assistant professor, told America.gov.
To treat well water for a household, Pittsburgh students have developed a process that does not require electricity:
1. Small magnetic iron particles are mixed with water, where the arsenic binds to the iron particles.
2. The water then flows through a small channel in which a magnetized wheel is partially submerged.
3. As a person turns this wheel, iron particles attach to the wheel and take the arsenic with them.
4. Any remaining iron is filtered from the water.
“Preliminary tests have shown that this type of device can remove large concentrations of arsenic,” Gao said. Students currently are refining their design to make it as effective and inexpensive as possible.
Once a successful prototype is ready, the Chinese universities will conduct a field test in early 2009 in Inner Mongolia, one of the most disadvantaged regions in China.
“For the EPA P3 Award project, the University of Pittsburgh’s University Honor College facilitates our collaboration with people and organizations in Inner Mongolia,” Gao said.
The Honor College offers a Mongolia field studies program, through which students travel to Mongolia and Chinese Inner Mongolia to plan projects that partner with local organizations and benefit people in that region, such as engineering projects in the Gobi Desert, public policy among rural migrants and nutritional evaluation of herding populations.
