(photo: Edi Israel/Flash90)
By David Shamah - May 27, 2015
Originally appeared here in the Times of Israel
Texas is no stranger to droughts, a fact that long ago prompted local leaders to seek technologies that ensure a steady supply of water. With Israel a world leader in water technology, it was only natural that the longhorn state would team up with the Jewish state.
One of the fruits of that collaboration — a joint desalination project involving researchers from the Technion in Haifa and the University of North Texas — has won the $125,000 Desal Prize competition sponsored by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) as part of the Securing Water for Food Grand Challenge, with support from Sida, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, and the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Israeli and American winners of the award announced that they will use the prize money to help build a water treatment plant in Jordan.
Researchers at the Technion’s Stephen and Nancy Grand Water Research Institute joined the competition at the request of researchers from the electrical engineering department at the University of North Texas. The American researchers, who focused on developing a solution to the alternative energy aspect of the competition, asked Prof. Carlos Dosoretz and Prof. Ori Lahav, researchers from the Technion Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, to design a solution for the desalination component of the project, and to submit a joint proposal. Other researchers from universities in Jordan, Nepal and Brazil worked on other components of the project. Read More