FLINT, Mich. (KXAN) — Families in Flint, Mich., still dealing with lead in their pipes have a continuous source of clean, free water thanks to a Texas man who developed a machine to pull water from the air.
Now, Moses West wants to take that machine to the Bahamas to aid in recovery after Hurricane Dorian ravaged the islands.
“This is a long-term recovery for the people there, and one of the stresses that they do not need to have is a lack of clean water,” West said.
KXAN reached West via video chat in Wisconsin, where he spent last week building a new generation of his water-harvesting devices. The military veteran is from San Antonio and developed his first machine partly at Camp Mabry in Austin.
The science behind the technology is simple condensation, the same principle that creates beads of water on the outside of a cold glass of water on a hot, humid day. The warmer and more humid the air outside, the better his machine is able to condense the water in the air, making it rain inside the shipping container-size device. A spigot and hose allow people to fill up any container with fresh, potable water.
“It’s like an endless source of water,” West said. “It’s a water generator.”
In Flint, where the weather is cooling off, the machine is currently extracting about 1,200 gallons a day, enough to keep more than 2,000 people hydrated. But in the tropical climate of the Bahamas, he anticipates it can create much more than that, which he saw when he took a similar machine to Puerto Rico.
“It’s like going downhill in a go-kart.”
Families in Flint are stocking up now, filling big containers and freezing some of the water to use in the winter, and West plans to take the machine to the Bahamas by the end of the month.
In order to get it there to give people free access to water, West needs to raise at least $15,000 in donations through his nonprofit, the Water Rescue Foundation. The clothing company Sevenly is also donating proceeds of its “Bahamas Strong” t-shirt to the foundation to help get the machine to the islands.
