15/07/2026
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1592745165796743&id=100051838253045&mibextid=0cALme
A Nobel Prize-winning scientist who grew up in a refugee community waiting for water deliveries has invented a machine that pulls drinking water directly from dry air.
Professor Omar Yaghi’s system uses specially engineered materials to capture water v***r from the atmosphere, even in arid and desert conditions.
Developed by his company Atoco, the technology can produce up to 264 gallons (1,000 liters) of clean water each day from a unit about the size of a 20-foot (6.1-meter) shipping container.
The machine does not require a conventional water source. Instead, its porous materials trap tiny water molecules in the air before releasing them as liquid water using ultra-low-grade heat.
That means the system could potentially run off-grid and continue working when hurricanes, droughts, or other disasters knock out centralized water and electricity supplies.
For Yaghi, the problem is deeply personal.
He grew up in a refugee community in Jordan without running water or reliable electricity. Water arrived only once every week or two, and he has recalled rushing to fill every available container before the supply stopped.
That experience helped shape his interest in developing a reliable source of water for communities facing the same uncertainty.
Yaghi, who won the 2025 Nobel Prize in chemistry, believes the technology could be especially useful for remote communities and small islands that regularly face drought, hurricane damage, or expensive water imports.
It may also offer an alternative to desalination, which can consume large amounts of energy and produce concentrated salty brine that may affect marine ecosystems, atmospheric water harvesting requires no seawater and can operate almost anywhere there is moisture in the air.
Around 2.2 billion people still lack safely managed drinking water, according to the United Nations, while roughly 4 billion experience severe water scarcity for at least one month each year.
Yaghi’s invention is still being developed for wider deployment, but its goal is simple: turn the moisture already present in the air into a dependable source of clean water.
📸Credit: Atoco
Learn more:
"‘Reimagining matter’: Nobel laureate invents machine that harvests water from dry air." The Guardian
