This is the first research project I have heard to come out of DARPA that I don’t consider to be pure evil. It’s actually quite interesting: they are trying to find a way to make water out of thin air, in order to sustain soldiers in arid climates.
A company that developed technology capable of creating water out of thin air nearly anywhere in the world is now under contract to nourish U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq.
The water-harvesting technology was originally the brainchild of the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which sought ways to ensure sustainable water supplies for U.S. combat troops deployed in arid regions like Iraq.
“The program focused on creating water from the atmosphere using low-energy systems that could reduce the overall logistics burden for deployed forces and provide potable water within the reach of the war fighter any place, any time,” said Darpa spokeswoman Jan Walker.
Apparently, the cost of flying in water by plane to these regions tends towards $30 a gallon, whereas this system would be more like 30 cents. The solution to it has been put together by a company called Aqua Sciences, Inc out of Florida (although I’m having a hard time finding their site to link to, as a number of companies have similar names). In any event, I wonder if a technology like this could be easily pirated and converted into an open source model so that we could all have access to it, including the residents of arid regions, rather than just the soldiers there to police them.
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7 Comments
I wonder if this would have any knock-on effects on local climate if it happened on any sort of scale?
Where did Luke Skywalker grow up? A “moisture farm.” Probobly the same thing. Half the new inventions you hear about are from sci-fi. StarWars isn’t even good sci-fi, though very good, and they still get stuff from it.
Ha ha Michael, I was thinking the same thing. Or maybe one of those suits from Dune, a StillSuit.
Beyond that, I don’t have much to add here. Sorry, the tank is dry.
Seems like you would most certainly have some, you know? To reference another fantasy book, Ursula LeGuin’s Wizard of Earthsea has some cool parts of it where Ged or whoever is manipulating storm-systems and they talk about how you can’t make it rain here without making it dry someplace else.
Man, I read that book so long ago I forgot I read it until you guys mentioned it here.
I think Dune’s idea of moisture catchers and still suits is pretty awesome. This sounds like something to pirate for the next burning man though…
I’m really interested in this idea of pirating or reverse-engineering military technology for non-violent creative cultural use…