Innovative Drinking Water Solution for the Developing World

The recent Opportunity Green Conference 2011 in Los Angeles featured an extraordinary presentation by Gaylon White, Director at the Eastman Chemical Company. The company has come up with a very promising social innovation to address the challenge of clean drinking water in the developing world. The company's unique water treatment technology is called HydroPack.

The HydroPack is essentially a 12 ounce plastic bag that can be thrown into practically any contaminated water source; it then produces a nutrient and electrolyte rich drink from it within eight to twelve hours. The drink is free of bacteria, viruses and even heavy metal. The membrane for this HydroPack is produced by Portland-based Hydration Technology Innovations (HTI), which makes use of Eastman's cellulose triacetate. The HydroPack pulls and filters the dirty water by the process of forward osmosis.

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Vikas is a staff writer for the Sustainable Development news and editorial section on Justmeans. He is an MBA with 20 years of managerial and entrepreneurial experience and global travel. He is the author of "The Power of Money" (Scholars, 2003), a book that presents a revolutionary monetary economic theory on poverty alleviation in the developing world. Vikas is also the official writer for an international social project for developing nations "Decisions for Life" run in collaboration between the ILO, the University of Amsterdam and the Indian Institute of Management.