HYDERABAD: In a first-of-its-kind initiative over Indian Railways, South Central Railway installed an ‘Atmospheric Water Generator’ kiosk on Platform no 1 at Secunderabad Railway Station on Thursday.
This kiosk has been installed as part of Green Initiatives and Water Conservation measures being adopted by the SCR. This innovative technology is developed under “Make in India” concept by Maithri Aquatech and named as Meghdoot.
In this system, instead of using normal water for filtration and consumption, water is directly harvested from the air through a series of steps.
Under this, air flows into the machine through a filtration system duly filtering out the contaminants present in the moisture-laden air.
Then the filtered air passes through a cooling chamber wherein the air is condensed. The condensed air is converted into water and drops into a storage tank provided for the purpose.
The dropped water from the tank passes through multiple level filtration which removes odour and any other impurities and then it passes through an Ultra Violet ray (UV) system.
Essential minerals are added to the filtered water before it is ready for consumption. The water produced under this system fulfils the norms of the World Health Organisation and also Indian standards for consumption. It is also approved by Ministry of Jal Shakti as safe and healthy.
The kiosk installed at Secunderabad station produces around 1,000 litres per day. It has been proposed to charge Rs 8 per litre along with the bottle and Rs 5 per litre if passengers bring their own containers. Coin vending machine facility is also available wherein passengers can directly fill their water bottles by dropping a Rs 5 coin. The storage tank is of food-grade material (stainless steel) and the freshness of water is maintained for several days.
Bottles to cost Rs 8
The kiosk installed at Secunderabad station produces around 1,000 litres per day. It has been proposed to charge Rs 8 per litre along with the bottle, and Rs 5 per litre if passengers bring their own containers with themselves.