Dubai: The first edition of the Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Global Water Awards on Thursday honoured 10 winners from eight countries who will share the $1 million prize for their ideas to help stave off global water scarcity using solar power-backed technology.
The winners from the UAE, Qatar, Canada, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Spain, Finland and Greece were honoured in a morning ceremony to mark the first round of the awards launched by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.
The awards are organised by UAE Water Aid Foundation (Suqia) which helped provide fresh water to eight million people in 19 countries in 2016, exceeding original targets by three million.
Winners were honoured by Shaikh Maktoum Bin Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai.
The inaugural awards received a total of 138 applications from 43 countries from research centres, universities and innovators in three main categories such as innovative projects, innovative research and development, and youth innovation.
Saeed Mohammad Al Tayer, Chairman of Suqia, noted that the United Nations Children’s Fund, better known as Unicef, has predicted that up to 600 million children will have limited access to clean water by 2040.
Al Tayer told the ceremony that Suqia is “committed to providing water to millions of disadvantaged and needy people around the world, without discrimination based on race, colour, religion or culture”.
“By the end of last year, our projects provided potable clean water to over eight million people in 19 countries worldwide. Suqia also collaborated with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation to provide relief [supplies] in Yemen, benefiting over a million people, according to the ministry’s report,” he said.
The winners
First place in the Innovative Research and Development Award — National Institutions category, was shared by Khalifa University for a dual-disinfection-modified biosand filter, coupled with solar pasteuriser system, and Masdar Institute at Khalifa University for a solar desalination process using a perforated black fabric under solar collector.
First place in the Innovative Research and Development Award — International Institutions category, went to Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), in cooperation with the Qatar General Electricity and Water Corporation (KAHRAMAA), for a solar-powered desalination technology based on TNO’s high-efficiency membrane distillation concept.
First place in the Innovative Projects Award went to the Elemental Water Makers from the Netherlands, for a solar-powered Reverse Osmosis (RO) plant to produce drinking water.
Dr Marta Vivar from Spain won the Innovative Youth Award for a hybrid solar photovoltaic-photochemical system for water disinfection and electricity generation.
