Extracting Freshwater From Saltwater: Unpacking Desalination With Mark Holtzapple

Returning to the podcast to discuss water desalination is Mark Holtzapple. Mark is a Professor of Chemical Engineering at Texas A&M University where he researches technologies that improve sustainability.

With close to 30 years of experience as a researcher, Mark is constantly finding new ways to turn waste into useful products. So what’s his take on obtaining fresh water from saltwater?

In this episode, you will learn about:

• What desalination is, and how Mark got started working with it.
• Techniques used to desalinate water, and how they have evolved over the years.
• How reverse osmosis contributes to water desalination.
• What vapor compression technology is, and why this may be the future of energy-efficient water desalination.

Imagine a world where freshwater is as plentiful as seawater… With the work that researchers like Mark Holtzapple are doing, this idea may be more realistic than you may think!

To find out more about Mark Holtzapple and his work, you can visit gfrc.tamu.edu.