Atmospheric Water Generator

[DrunkWookiee]

Expensive but looks pretty interesting. It also doubles as a Reverse Osmosis purifier.

http://www.ecoloblue.com/en/home-office ... ature_link" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[spacecase0]

they come in 6 colors,
and they have a buy button on the web page
that is way better than the last one I was trying to buy and could not because the company was so messed up.

[crypto]

BUT UNCLE OWEN, I WAS GOING IN TO TOSHI STATION TO PICK UP SOME POWER CONVERTERS!!!

[Rock2Fox]

BUT UNCLE OWEN, I WAS GOING IN TO TOSHI STATION TO PICK UP SOME POWER CONVERTERS!!!

you rule dude.

This thingie looks pretty fantastic - the only thing I dislike is that you need to buy semi-annual or biannual filter packages.

[kiwilrdg]

Save some money. Buy a dehumidifier and a carbon water filter.

[spacecase0]

Save some money. Buy a dehumidifier and a carbon water filter.

I tried that,
you need more than that for it to be drinkable.
with only one or 2 carbon filters the water will still be horrible.
the UV sterilization is very important.
also the dehumidifiers only last a few years of continuous use like that, and most of mine have died in 6 months.

save some time and get one that is all integrated.

[NightHiker]

[DrunkWookiee]

BUT UNCLE OWEN, I WAS GOING IN TO TOSHI STATION TO PICK UP SOME POWER CONVERTERS!!!

LMAO

Yep, it's like the Star Wars moisture vaporators.

[DrunkWookiee]

This thingie looks pretty fantastic - the only thing I dislike is that you need to buy semi-annual or biannual filter packages.

If you have ideal humidity and only 3 or 4 people, you could just run it every other day and stretch the filter life to a year. The 6 month filters are the carbon elements. The reverse osmosis and UV filters will last 2 years.

They offer spare filters and package deals with up to 5 years of filters.

[Hatch]

I've been looking at these lately. Super cool. The one thing that concerns me is the humidity requirement, particularly in the winter. Their site says that the generator needs 35% humidity minimum in order to produce water. Assuming you install the thing inside, that's going to be a problem for anyone in a region with cold winters. I don't know the formula they used for this, but according to a couple of sites I found (Google "indoor humidity") if it's 0F and 75% relative humidity outside, and you're heating the interior of your house to 70F, your indoor relative humidity is only 4%. So zero water production.

Refrigeration AC pulls water out of the air as well, but I don't know how much. I guess before I drop $1400 on one of those generators, it might be smart to drop $50 on a humidity sensor/gauge and measure the relative humidity in the house at various times throughout the year.

--Hatch

[Monklicous]

.

[Hatch]

".....................This appliance produces water at an average rate of 20 cents per gallon......................" That is just for filtering. Add in the electric to cool and heat the water for both taps and the price is way more.

Tap water is~.07, almost a third the cost. Get a Brita or in line filter for main sink.

True, but what if the SHTF and the city water is shut off? If you've got a solar panel and an Ecoloblue, you can produce an endless supply of water from moisture in the air. That's the reason I was even considering getting one, filtering was pretty much an afterthought.

--Hatch

[spacecase0]

Tap water is~.07, almost a third the cost. Get a Brita or in line filter for main sink.

first, I thought tap water was way less than that...

hatch is right, you just can't trust city water.
also the fluoride in the water is bad for your brain, and I am allergic to it.
if you can use tap water, why would you bother with a britta as it only changes taste ?

[derajer]

The manual indicates it requires an input power of 1080w, that would be a lot of electricity for 7 gallons a day. Certainly that's not reasonable for any degree of self sufficiency. I have had the water from similar devices and it is quite good.

[Monklicous]

.

[Hatch]

I don't know a whole lot about solar but I would think you would need a hell of a setup to make this work? Can someone with an electrical background look at the usage/output to this set up?

Yeah, reading through the specs in the manual the power requirements are pretty hefty. Power consumption can be up to 1100W, with up to a 10A draw. A standard 110VAC 15A residential circuit is only rated to 12A continuous load max, so it looks like you need a dedicated circuit for the Ecoloblue, just like you would for an 1100W microwave oven. Now, I can't imagine it uses 1100W continuously, since it doesn't run the heater, cooler, and pumps continuously. But even figuring 50% utilization, that's a lot of power usage (13.2KW per day ).

One big hitch with powering the Ecoloblue from solar is the fact that the device is not designed to run on 12VDC (and the reason will soon become apparent). In order to run the Ecoloblue from DC power we'll need an inverter. The device uses 1100W of power, or 10A at 110VAC. Inverted, this means the device will use around 100A at 12VDC [the equation to convert AC watts to DC amps is: (AC watts/12)*1.1=DC amps]. At the assumed usage above, that means around 1200AH per day to operate the device.

When building solar power solutions, AH is the easiest way to calculate sizing, because it's a simple factor of amps in over time versus amps out over time. Knowing that our daily load is 1200AH, we'll need a battery bank that can provide that much juice in the course of day. That's pretty simple to figure out. If we use 100AH deep-cycle batteries, at a minimum we'll need 12 for our battery bank. At $300 a piece, that's $3600 for batteries. Ouch.

Now for panels to charge the battery bank. Most locations with direct sun are going to get around 6-8 hours worth of full output from their solar panels averaged over the course of a sunny day. Panels are rated in watts, but at 16VDC, not 12VDC. So a high-end 400W commercial solar panel will produce 24A at maximum output. If we assume we have 8 hours worth of output to charge our 1200AH battery bank, we'll need an average output of 150A per hour. To get this, we'll need 7 panels connected in parallel. At $3,000 each, that $21,000 worth of solar panels, just to run the Ecoloblue. Holy shit.

So the solar-powered Ecoloblue solution is going to cost us $26,000 ($1,400 for the Ecoloblue, $3,600 for batteries, $21,000 for panels) plus the cost of an inverter, a charge controller, and an electrician to install and certify it all (probably another $2,000 for all of that). Factor in sales tax, freight, etc., and you're basically talking $30,000.

So yeah, after running the numbers, you're probably better off digging a well and using solar to run your pump when you need water. The Ecoloblue sounds like a great SHTF resource, but those power requirements just kill the idea. Now, if you're just wanting a reverse osmosis filter (which will remove fluoride from your tap water), maybe it's not such a bad investment. As long as you're okay with it not working when the lights go out.

--Hatch

[Hatch]

I forgot to mention that having read the product manual, unless you live in an open air hut in a rainforest, you're never going to get 7 gallons of water per day from the moisture in the air. That level of output requires the Ecoloblue to be in an environment with 90% relative humidity. If the interior of your house is at 90% relative humidity you must be living in a steam room at the YMCA.

--Hatch

[spacecase0]

the product talked about already likely has a very low duty cycle and does not require nearly as many what hours as I see in the calculations.

there are designs that require less electricity
this one looks very fun, to bad you can't buy it yet...
http://www.gadgetgrid.com/2007/04/06/ge ... ar-energy/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
this one looks great, but likely very expensive.
http://www.airwatercorp.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

this looks good, and like they are thinking like we are here.
http://www.a2wh.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
$15K
Options available for units that work in humidities as low as 20% RH

[Hatch]

the product talked about already likely has a very low duty cycle and does not require nearly as many what hours as I see in the calculations.

Unfortunately, we don't have documented information about the duty cycle of the appliance (or at least, I couldn't find any).

If you figure it's 25%, cut the estimate in half and it's still a lot (600AH/day). Even at 10% it's 240AH/day, which would require at least three $300 batteries and two $3000 solar panels, plus the same inverter, charge controller, and electrician (est. $7500 + the appliance itself).

An 1100W appliance is just hard to run off solar.


--Hatch

[spacecase0]

An 1100W appliance is just hard to run off solar.
--Hatch

very true,
I plan on using a salt solution of calcium chloride or lithium chloride for lower humidity operation to pull water out of the air and then use a solar distiller to get the pure water out of the solution.
it will be way lower price than electric solar panels.
I am working on the design and so far it will be lots easier to have a small solar panel to run pumps, but the total cost is still fairly low.