WSAA's February Research and Innovation Newsletter

Welcome to our February 2024 Research and Innovation Newsletter.

If you see any interesting articles, projects or news about new research that others might be interested in, please send to [email protected] – it could even make the next newsletter due in March 2024.

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Industry Innovation and Resilience

Water Industry Careers Portal Launch

A collaboration between WSAA and the Australia Water Association has delivered a bold, unifying and compelling campaign to promote careers in the water industry.

The campaign aims to attract new talent and remind those who already work here of the importance of what they do.

Read more at PhysOrg

New Zwitterionic Hydrogel to Remove Pollutants from Water

MIT chemical engineers have created a zwitterionic hydrogel system for single-step water treatment with minimal environmental footprint.

The new material seems to be the magic pill for removing a broad range of both organic and inorganic pollutants. It’s used to form the scaffold material, or backbone within a hydrogel (a porous three-dimensional network of polymer chains that contains a significant amount of water).

The key to the innovation is that zwitterionic molecules have very strong attraction to water compared to other materials used to make hydrogels or polymers,

Read more at PhysOrg

AI Driven Tool to Address Complexities in Wastewater Treatment

Researchers from Peking University have developed a new platform to address the escalating complexities of pollutants and inadequacies in traditional wastewater treatment plants.

The platform aims to harness extensive microbiome and engineering data from WWTPs around the world and by using advanced AI-driven tools, analyses the data to identify optimal microbiomes, upgrade facilities, and effectively respond to pollution accidents.

Read more at PhysOrg

Efficiently Moving Urea Out of Contaminated Water

Researchers from Worcester Polytechnic Institute have developed a material to remove urea from water, and potentially convert it into hydrogen gas.

The new material is made of nickel and cobalt atoms with carefully tailored electronic structures. The material has the potential to selectively oxidize urea in an electrochemical reaction.

Read more at PhysOrg

WORKING WITH THE COMMUNITY

Australians Would Pay to Provide Clean Drinking Water to Remote Communities

Researchers from the ANU have found that the average Australian household would be willing to pay between $324 and $847 per year to extend drinking water infrastructure to remote communities.

The results, based on a survey of more than 3,500 Australians, seem to indicate that Australians are prepared to contribute more to water infrastructure in remote communities from national taxes.

WSAA’s February Research and Innovation Newsletter