Aqua Cleaner

Members: Group’s name: Science People

• Delahaye, Emilio Agustín
• Gallar, Virginia Belén
• Guerreiro, Emmanuel
• Iriart de la Rosa, Nicolás
• Jardel Faragasso, Lautaro Francisco
• Mulé, Franco Javier
• Raimondo Zavaroni, María Milagros

Problems

The consumption and use of both drinking and unsafe water is one of the main problems affecting the generations of recent years due to the imminent threats posed by the lack of water on planet Earth.Whether it is a naturally humid region of the globe, with easy access to water, or arid zones, with little annual rainfall according to the latest data provided, in 2019, by NASA in the PMM (Precipitation Measurement Mission) project [ref1]. The management of this vital resource, for human life and the equilibrium of the planet, is a problem of ascending hierarchy and requires immediate attention. This is especially important in arid and/or rural areas with little access to drinking water for consumption and for irrigation of crops.

One of the arid areas affected by this problem is the city of Mendoza, Argentina, which was declared a water and alluvial emergency by the provincial government in 2007. The majority of people affected by this situation do not have a responsible use of the water resource, either due to lack of information, or because the state does not impose an effective regulation and, in addition, the average consumption that could be recovered per user is between 200 and 250 L/day. Based on this and the data published in the study "Earth's Freshwater Future: Extremes of Flood and Drought" [ref 2] obtained by NASA satellites, it has been projected that in these areas the probability of an extensive drought and the adoption of a strict regulatory system on the use of water as used in Western Europe is very high. Taking into account the above mentioned model where the average cost is 3.36 €/mm3, extrapolated to the situation in question, this would represent a high cost for the standard of living in these places.

Objectives

• Reduce irresponsible water consumption
• Minimize water usage expenses
• Reuse greywater
• Reduce energy consumption
• Raise awareness of water emergency and responsible use of water
• Contributing to a sustainable future

Proposed solutions

The solution proposed is an integrated system of reuse of grey wastewater from a personal home, through the implementation of a specialized filter for the purification of these, but without their respective potabilization. The same system will be regulated by means of a mobile application, in which it will be possible to know the current state of the equipment, monitor and control manually the percentage of reused and pure water, among other functions.

It is proposed that, ideally, the application begins in the construction of a house. In this case, it is necessary to implement a more complex piping system than the traditional one (which only has one water inlet and one outlet to the sewer). The new system would consist of a system of water cleaning and replenishment to different sectors of the network where it allows the reduction of water network

Circuits (Figure 1)

1. Mains water.
2. Reused water.
3. Sewage (waste).
4. Collection, cleaning.

Where 1. and 2. are of income and; 3. and 4. are of drainage.

Figure 1. Estimated plan of the pipes of a new house

For a better interpretation, it is interesting to divide the system into different parts.

Tank system: This consists of 2 water tanks, one exclusively for mains water (as the traditional system currently presents), and a second tank in which the recycled water would be stored, and if necessary, a portion of mains water can be provided to avoid shortages in the system.

Tap water: It consists of modifying how the distribution of drinking water is given today, only to leave it available in taps that are for exclusive use, when it is for human consumption. Once it is used, it passes to the collection system to be filtered and reused.

Filter system, cleaning: the water from the collection system passes through a small tank that is before the filter, which would allow discarding the collection in cases where the fluid may ruin the filter system.

It would then enter the filtration system, which consists of a 3-step treatment. In the first place, a cleaning of solids by decantation or paper filters. In the second place, a system of carbon filters, which allows the cleaning of inorganic residues and in the third place, the exposure to UV light for the elimination of microbiological threats.

Use of recycled water: The water that was filtered will be used for systems where the person does not consume it directly, such as showers, toilet flushes, among others.

In turn, this water can be reused again, as it would return mostly to the filtration system named above.

Disposal system: When disposing of water used in toilets or water that may be hazardous to the filtration system, the traditional sewage system is used.

In the case of houses already built, the hot water pipe is interfered with and the filter is assembled so that only recycled water begins to run, which first heats its temperature in the water heater. Figure 2.

Figure 2: Estimative plan for pipes of the old house.

Initial budget on a small scale.

Using local retail prices it was estimated a price for a PMV of $ 1500 plus the expenses associated with labor in terms of equipment installation and development of the app.

Based on the average price of water per m3 in Europe, and the consumption of a typical family in the same region, the initial cost of materials is amortized, in a period of 2.3 to 4 years depending on the relationship between consumption and recycling of the family.

Mobile application

A mobile application was devised that allows the user to have the following functionalities

• system control: equipment on/off, mains water outlet or reused.
• equipment status: information on filter maintenance, inputs, ultraviolet light, and current status of the system.
• daily consumption: data referring to the quantity of litres used in each part of the dwelling.
• water availability: quantity of litres available for reuse.
• savings: to show what percentage of the water used from the network is not discarded and is in the system.
• energy consumption

It also has a ranking, in which statistical data is compared between the different users (it would relate: percentage of savings, net consumption of water and energy consumption).

Examples are shown below:

Future developments

Analyzing the possibilities of expansion of the product, three potential improvements to the system have been detected: solar panels and solar water heater, water collection and artificial intelligence. These will depend on the geographical region in which you want to install the equipment, at the convenience of the user.

• Energy system and water heating:

This extension will consist of solar panels and a water heater. The system will be attached after the reused water storage tank, and will work as follows

1. With the water coming from the reused water tank, the solar panels are cooled, increasing their efficiency.
2. The water used for cooling is preheated and travels to the solar water heater.
3. Inside the water heater, the water is heated to the point desired by the user.
4. The water heater is then attached to the reused water piping system.

This extension will represent energy sustainability for the system and will reduce the costs that this implies for the user, since preheating the water considerably reduces the energy used by the water heater.

• Water collection:

At this point, an attempt is made to increase the amount of water available for reuse, such as rainwater or dew.

This collection system will allow the user to use more water at no additional cost for the amount of it.

• Artificial Intelligence:

The proposed I.A. will help the optimization and security of the system, since it will have functionalities such as:

• modeling to the behavior related to the use of water
• the detection of anomalies and elimination of only that volume of water.
• the automation of the entire system, without the need for user management of the application, which would be merely informative.

Bibliography

• https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/precipitation-missions-release-two-decades-of-rain-snow-data
• https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/earth-s-freshwater-future-extremes-of-flood-and-drought
• http://bdigital.uncu.edu.ar/objetos_digitales/8304/catalogo-emergencia-hidrica-web21.pdf
• http://argentinambiental.com/legislacion/mendoza/decreto-11807-emergencia-hidrica/
• https://iwa-network.org/current-and-future-challenges-for-water-resources-management/
• https://www.idealista.com/news/finanzas/economia/2017/11/22/749010-imagen-del-dia-el-coste-del-consumir-agua-en-europa
• https://www.redalyc.org/pdf/3828/382837651006.pdf
• https://www.ina.gob.ar/legacy/pdf/ifrrhh/01_016_Duek.pdf
• http://ve.scielo.org/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0798-40652014000100007