Formerly one of South Africa’s greatest international tennis stars on the ATP World Tour, Wayne Ferreira is turning air into pure drinking water in an effort to solve global water shortage problems.
Now retired from tennis, he lives and works in California where his company, EcoloBlue, serves up eco-friendly devices called Atmospheric Water Generators.
By generating water at the source, Ferreira and his team hope to save aid agencies hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bottled water that is routinely shipped into disaster relief zones.
And, as our San Francisco correspondent Rebecca Bowring reports, the technology has tremendous potential for deployment in California, which is in the grip of a severe drought.
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UPSOUND - Wayne Ferreira, Founder and President, EcoloBlue
This is obviously our home office unit, it's the smallest one that we have...
From the well-irrigated lawns of Wimbledon tennis club to the parched soil of northern California…
Wayne Ferreira has crossed continents to head up a business pioneering sustainable technology.
His Atmospheric Water Generators, or AWGs, look a little like water coolers…although behind the plastic casing lies a system for condensing water molecules in the air into water you can drink.
SOT Wayne Ferreira, Founder and President, EcoloBlue
What the machine does is that it has a condenser, so it sucks in, it has a fan and it sucks in air, it condenses the humidity out of the air, kind of freezes it.
Ferreira says that at 70 per cent humidity, EcoloBlue's smallest unit can produce up to 30 liters of water a day.
He learned about the technology many years ago but waited to retire from tennis before jumping into a new career in water sustainability.
SOT Wayne Ferreira, Founder and President, EcoloBlue
Ideally how you can explain to people in a really simple form is that we can make it rain every day.
Physiotherapist Michael DiBenedetto is one of EcoloBlue's customers embracing water self-sufficiency.
Wary of impurities, he's been filtering tap water for decades, and says he loves the science behind the AWG.
SOT Michael DiBenedetto, EcoloBlue customer
It has advantages over many other systems. And there's something magical about knowing you're getting pure drinking water from the air. There's something really cool about that. And there's an educational side as well for young kids, because they find it fascinating.
Ferreira and his team hope to improve water access across drought-stricken California.
They're in talks with several local water boards, as well as the military -- including the National Guard.
And they're working on large scale solutions for further afield…like 40 foot containers that can be deployed in refugee camps following a disaster.
UPSOT Wayne Ferreira, Founder and President, EcoloBlue
This is perfect for an emergency solution or more, emergency preparedness…
EcoloBlue technology's already being sold in the Middle East, the Philippines, and in China, where it's manufactured.
And Ferreira's confident it has potential applications in South Africa too.
SOT Wayne Ferreira, Founder and President, EcoloBlue
It's my home so I ideally would to like to get it in there. Africa in general is difficult to work with with a lot of different governments, but there's a huge need for it there.
BACK ANNO: That was Wayne Ferreira finishing that report by Rebecca Bowring.
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