The provision of safe drinking water has been one of the developing world’s most fundamental challenges. This challenge is made even more difficult and pressing by natural disasters such as the 2004 Asian tsunami. With disease spreading during the post-tsunami period, survivors desperately needed access to safe drinking water. In some ravaged communities in Sri Lanka and the Southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, emergency relief came in the shape of an innovative water disinfection unit, the UV Waterworks (UVW). This robust device kills pathogenic bacteria, viruses and parasites in water from any source, using nothing more than ultraviolet (UV) light from an unshielded fluorescent lamp powered by a 40-watt power source.
The brains behind the UVW is Indian-born physicist Dr. Ashok Gadgil, who began searching for a way to purify water cheaply in developing countries after an outbreak of “Bengal cholera” which killed tens of thousands of individuals monthly in the summer of 1993 in North India. The application of the UVW has the potential to resolve the crisis of potable water that many developing countries have faced for ages.
