Home › Case Studies › Watergen provides drinking water from air to residents in India
India is high on the list of countries that fail to meet its population’s demand for access to clean water close to homes. There is not a single Indian city that can fully meet the requirements for potable water from its taps for this nation of 1.3 billion people. As much as 40% of city water is lost due to pipe leaks and theft via unauthorized connections. When irrigation wells dry up, farmers need to use untreated wastewater, laced with industrial chemicals and human sewerage, to grow their crops.
In a pilot project, to coincide with Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu’s historic visit to India, Watergen provided water to tens of thousands of people in New Delhi over a period of one month. On average, 2,000 people had access to clean, fresh, unpolluted water every single day, from a unit that was placed at Connaught Place, at the entrance to the Charkha Musuem.
Watergen then presented Prime Minister Modi with a work-plan that could potentially solve the water crisis in India, bypassing problems such as failed infrastructure high levels of air pollution.
In 2018, the worst floods experienced in a century hit the southern Indian state of Kerala, leaving nearly 500 people dead and over 1 million homeless. 3,200 emergency relief camps, housing over 800,000 people, were set up in the area. It goes without saying that maintaining sanitation and preventing disease proved to be a significant challenge.
Watergen and TATA Trusts stepped in to help with the relief efforts, and two GEN-350 units were installed in the region – one in Alappuzha, and the other in the Christian seminary village of Parumala in the Pathanamthitta district.
The units helped provide pure drinking water to thousands of residents every day.
Following a special request by the seminary manager, Father MC Kariakose, GEN-350 continues to operate in Kerala, providing fresh, clean water for staff and visitors until today.