Testing Sewage For Coronavirus: Faster And Better Than Current Medical Tests?

Could a sewage-based coronavirus test provide faster and better results than existing medical tests?

By: Ringo Bones

Current rapid coronavirus antibody tests recently got a bad rap after providing a lot of false-positive results, but could testing a city or community’s sewer system for the COVID 19 virus provide faster and more accurate results? Scientists led by UK’s Centre for Ecology and Hydrology are working on a standardized test to “count” the amount of coronavirus in a wastewater sample. The test could pick up COVID 19 infection spikes up to 10 days earlier than with existing medical based tests. Newcastle University’s Prof. David Graham and his colleagues have now developed a way to quantify the genetic material from the coronavirus.

Early in the COVID 19 pandemic, research revealed that people infected with the virus “shed” viral material in their feces. That insight prompted an interest in “sewage epidemiology”. A similar test used by Chinese epidemiologists working with Italian health authorities during the spring of 2020 produced test results showing that coronavirus could already had been present in Italy near the end of December 2019. The researchers want to fine tune and reproduce this test before it can be rolled out as part of a COVID 19 alert system.

Clean Drinking Water: Vital In Halting The Spread Of COVID 19?

Given the WHO and the US CDC’s hand-washing guidelines are somewhat “water-intensive”, is clean drinking water vital in stopping the spread of COVID 19?

By: Ringo Bones

Given that you have to sing Happy Birthday twice while washing your hands with soap and water – the now recommended length of time required to lower one’s chances of catching COVID 19 to an absolute minimum, the global pandemic that have paused modern life raised concern whenever when it will hit places where clean drinking water is not widely available. The world’s various health organizations have waited in trepidation on how COVID 19 might spread in the poorer parts of Africa and other parts of the world lacking in readily available clean water, not just for drinking, but for washing one’s hands. Add to that a lack of personal protective equipment to the medical doctors and related health workers in these places, it could be the proverbial “perfect storm” when it comes to the spreading of the COVID 19 virus.

Thankfully, at the moment, COVID 19 spread in parts of the world where clean drinking water is a rarity were not as bad as that of the spread of the virus in the world’s major metropolitan areas during the spring of 2020. Maybe it might just be due to sheer luck that the clean water deprived parts of the world has not become a corona-virus hotspot for now at least. But the medical charities currently operating in these places are bolstering local clean drinking water supplies in order to nip an emerging COVID 19 infection in the bud.

Is England Running Out Of Water?

With a dire warning from the UK’s chief executive of the Environment Agency, will England run out of water during the next 25 years?

By: Ringo Bones

Although he offered relatively easy manageable steps to avert such a crisis if the UK’s citizens act now, UK’s chief executive of the Environmental Agency Sir James Bevan had issued a warning that the country is facing the “jaws of death” – a term often used to define the point where water demand from the country’s rising population could soon surpass the falling supply resulting from climate change and according to Bevan, this could happen within the next 25 years. However, this so-called “water crisis” could be avoided with ambitious action to cut people’s water use by a third and leakage from water pipes by 50-percent, he says, along with big new reservoirs, more desalination plants and transfers of water across the country.

In his speech six days ago, Bevan says: “Water companies all identify the same thing as their biggest operating risk: climate change.” By 2040, more than half of our summers are expected to be hotter than the 2003 heatwave, he says, leading to more water shortages and potentially 50 to 80-percent less water in some rivers in the summer. Quite a dire warning indeed given that the last time the UK’s water shortage got worldwide attention was back in 1959 when a drought in Speyside, Scotland triggered a “minor emergency” when the streams that gave Scotch Whiskey its distinctive flavor dried up.

The UK’s projected water shortage is actually caused by projected population growth as it is expected to rise from 67-million to 75-million in 2050, increasing the demand for water. But Bevan says the average person’s daily use of 140 liters could be cut to 100 liters in 20 years by more efficient use in homes and gardens. Currently, about a third of water is loss to leaks or wastage. Although, the most controversial change needed to increase supply is building new mega-reservoirs, such as that proposed near Abingdon in Oxfordshire. This was deemed controversial because according to Bevan: “We have not built a new reservoir in the UK for decades, largely because clearing all the planning and legal hurdles necessary is so difficult and local opposition so fierce”.   

CanOWater: Natural Spring Water in Aluminum Cans?

Given the environmental concerns on the widespread use of single-use plastic bottles, are aluminum cans the ideal packaging of natural spring water on the go?

By: Ringo Bones

According to environmental experts, if current trends continue, as in 8 million metric tons of plastic ending up in our oceans each year, there would be more single-use plastic wastes in our oceans than fish by weight in the year 2050. Would replacing single-use plastic with a more “recyclable” material be the way to go? “Aluminum cans have the highest recycling rate of any product out there and a recycled can could be back on the shelf as another one in just 60 days,” said Ariel Booker, co-founder of CanO Water. The company was founded by three friends – Ariel Booker, Perry Alexander Fielding and Josh White, all are under the age of 25 when they started back in February 17, 2017.

There is little doubt that during the past few years that aluminum has outpaced plastics in terms of recycling. As of June 2018, 73.6-percent of all use beverage package recycling in the EU, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland are of aluminum cans, and the rate in Germany and Finland is 99-percent. Given its widespread recyclability, is aluminum cans the ideal container for drinking water on the go?     

                                                                                               

Unfortunately, I still have doubts whether the resulting environmental impact of reducing the amount of plastic entering our oceans annually will be transferred to the increased carbon footprint in the transport of CanO Water given that aluminum is several times heavier than the PET plastic competition. And given my experience with industrial polymers from high-school chemistry, I too have doubts on how many times we can recycle / reprocess PET plastic bottles with reasonable economic viability and environmental impact. Maybe CanO Water is environmentally friendly in the long run but given that the product has only been widely marketed during the last quarter of 2018, only time will tell if the aluminum can packaging of CanO Water will prove more environmentally friendly than the PET plastic bottle competition.  

Cape Town, South Africa: The First Major City To Run Out Of Water?

Given that the surrounding regions had experienced its most severe drought in living memory for about three years now; will Cape Town be the first major city to run out of water by Earth Day 2018? 

By: Ringo Bones

With draconian water rationing measures has since been enforced since 2017 due to the region experiencing its worst ever drought in more than a century, it looks like Cape Town, South Africa which, at present, is suffering from severe municipal water supply shortage, could be the first major city ever in living memory to run out of water. At present, Cape Town’s water supply is sourced from six dams which are now currently at dangerously low levels and policymakers in charge of the city’s water supply warns that by April 22, 2018 – Cape Town could completely run out of its drinking water supply. 

In a recent BBC interview back in January 17, 2018, Cape Town’s mayor Patricia DeLille had criticized Cape Town residents for their selfishness in not following measures in conserving water for their daily domestic use despite of the severe water shortage plaguing the city. At present, the level Cape Town’s dams now stands at 28-percent which is critically low for its day to day function. And experts say that the so-called “Day Zero” will be reached once the levels of Cape Town’s dams reach 13-percent and this could happen by Sunday, April 22, 2018, which happens to be this year’s Earth Day – which is quite ironic indeed.

Graphene: The Secret To Low Energy Desalination?

Given that current desalination technologies cost millions of dollars and huge energy input to run it, will the newfangled graphene-based desalination devices drastically cut costs and energy consumption? 

By: Ringo Bones

According to the United Nations, it is expected by the year 2025 14-percent of the world’s population will encounter water scarcity. Given that the current “most energy efficient” way to desalinate water – i.e. reverse osmosis desalination plants – still costs hundreds of millions of dollars to build and their energy requirements is beyond that of a remote small town in sub-Saharan Africa to generate. Fortunately, a new wonder material, like graphene, could drastically slash the energy and cost requirements to build a desalination plant big enough to provide potable water to a typical out of the way small town. 

Graphene-oxide membranes have attracted considerable attention as promising candidates for new filtration technologies, especially ones that are less expensive and require lower energy to operate than existing ones. Now the much sought-after development of making membranes capable of sieving common salts has been achieved. New research demonstrates the real-world potential of providing clean drinking water for millions of people who struggle to access adequate clean water sources. 

When common salts are dissolved in water, they always form a “shell” of water molecules around the salt’s molecular structure. This allows the tiny capillaries of the graphene-oxide membranes to block the salt from flowing along with the water. Water molecules are able to pass through the membrane barrier and flow anomalously fast which is ideal for application of these membranes for desalination. 

Professor Rahul Nair at the University of Manchester said “Realisation of scalable membranes with uniform pore size down to atomic scale is a significant step forward and will open new possibilities for improving the efficiency of desalination technology”. Prof. Nair’s experimental desalination device at the National Graphene Institute of Manchester uses a one-atom thick graphene filter.

Water Lens: Using Water To Purify Water?

Even though the concept is as zany as a Saturday Morning Cartoon premise, but can one use water to purify water making it safe to drink?

 

By: Ringo Bones

Two years ago, a Civil Engineering sophomore at the University of Buffalo named Deshawn Henry managed to use one of those zany Saturday Morning Cartoon premise as a working principle behind his device that uses water to purify water making it safe for everyone to drink. And best of all, the method is by far the most inexpensive way so far to provide constant supply of clean drinking water to over a billion people who still don’t have access to it. Unsafe drinking water results in the death of children below five years of age every minute, but Deshawn Henry’s invention could soon reduce childhood mortality due to a lack of access to clean drinking water. 

The device itself has a rather humble appearance, with a six-foot-tall frame of 2-by-4 pieces of lumber topped with a lens constructed of plastic sheeting and water which focuses down onto a treatment container for the water. The simplicity of the design and the inexpensive nature of the building materials mean that many living in impoverished areas would be able to obtain the technology and provide clean water for their families. Once operational, Henry’s Water Lens can eliminate up to 99.9-percent of pathogens in a liter of water in about an hour by magnifying sunlight and heating a liter of water to about 130 to 150 degrees Fahrenheit. All in all, given the promising initial results of being able to purify water using relatively low cost materials, Henry’s Water Lens is not bad for a “mere” summer project.