A new DIY robot called PetBot is a unique development that will help to recycle ordinary plastic bottles. The process is not yet fully automated, and the device does not claim to be used for commercial purposes, but the benefits of its operation are obvious. Built by JRT3D, the PetBot automates the plastic recycling process by cutting PET bottles into the tape and then turning them into filament. The robot combines several mechanics, each of which performs its part of the task. It carries out the two separate processes at the same time using the same stepper motor.
The machine automates the plastic recycling process by cutting PET bottles and turning them into filament.
Safe and readily available water is important for public health, whether it is used for drinking, domestic use, food production, or recreational purposes. Despite the vast quantity of water on Earth, just 2.5% of it is freshwater, and an estimated 785 million people lack a clean source of drinking water. Desalination of seawater could be a vital technology to meet the world’s drinking water needs.
Now, Korean engineers have developed a new desalination technique that takes just minutes to make seawater drinkable. They used a new nanofiber membrane distillation process that could desalinate water with 99.99% efficiency. Engineers believe that commercializing such technology could help humankind cope with the shortage of fresh drinking water in the future.
Amongst the most challenging issues in membrane distillation is membrane wetting that causes the pollution of permeate, reduction in vapor production, and finally, reduction in the performance of the membrane. If a membrane exhibits wetting during membrane distillation operation, the membrane must be replaced.
Eviation, which has been described as the “Tesla of aircraft” for working on the first compelling long-range electric aircraft, has unveiled the production version of its Alice aircraft.
UC Santa Cruz is investigating this method as a possible generator of solar energy that would allow for the saving of 63.5 billion gallons of water from evaporation annually, a massive windfall for a state that sometimes rations water and which regularly suffers from droughts.
If mounted above irrigation canals, the shade of solar panels would reduce evaporation by 63 billion gallons, while generating clean energy.
The world’s animals and wildlife are becoming extinct at a greater rate than at any time in human history. Could technology help to save threatened species?
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A device that can generate electricity while desalinating seawater has been developed by researchers in Saudi Arabia and China, who claim that their new system is highly efficient at performing both tasks. The device uses waste heat from the solar cell for desalination, thereby cooling the solar cell. It also produces no concentrated brine as waste, cutting its potential environmental impact.
In many parts of the world, climate change and population growth are putting huge demands on freshwater supplies. In some coastal regions, desalination – removing the salt from brackish water or seawater to turn it into fresh water – is increasingly being used to meet demand. Indeed, there are now around 16000 desalination plants around the world producing about 95 million cubic metres of freshwater every day.
However, current desalination systems can be expensive and energy hungry, producing significant carbon emissions. The process can also produce highly concentrated salt water, or brine, as well as freshwater. This brine can also contain toxic chemicals introduced during the desalination process and if not disposed of properly, it can have negative environmental impacts.
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The story of humanity is progress, from the origins of humanity with slow disjointed progress to the agricultural revolution with linear progress and furthermore to the industrial revolution with exponential almost unfathomable progress.
This accelerating rate of change of progress is due to the compounding effect of technology, in which it enables countless more from 3D printing, autonomous vehicles, blockchain, batteries, remote surgeries, virtual and augmented reality, robotics – the list can go on and on. These devices in turn will lead to mass changes in society from energy generation, monetary systems, space colonization, automation and much more!
This trajectory of progress is now leading us into a time period that is, “characterized by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital and biological spheres”, called by many the technological revolution or the 4th industrial revolution — in which everything will change, from the underlying structure and fundamental institutions of society to how we live our day-to-day lives.
00:00 Intro. 01:30 Pillar 1 – Computing. 05:02 Pillar 2 – Global Connectivity. 08:08 Pillar 3 – Big Data. 09:48 Pillar 4 – AI 11:55 The Technological Revolution.
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