Vapur has added a helpful feature to its line of soft, collapsible “Anti Bottles.” Not one to get too fancy with names, Vapur calls it the MicroFilter and sells it in a package with its 1-L Eclipse Anti-Bottle. The system provides a light, convenient way of purifying, carrying and drinking water in the wild.

With the MicroFilter, Vapur builds upon its strongest attribute: portability. Its Anti-Bottles are versatile for transport thanks to their soft, collapsible build. When empty, they can compact down and stow easily. When full, they still offer more pliability than other bottle options for stuffing into tight spaces. Read more

For most of us, access to clean water is just a turn of the tap away, but in many developing countries women and children are often tasked with fetching water and carrying it considerable distances in containers – often on their heads. Aside from the strain this places on the neck and back, these containers can be discarded jerry cans and buckets that originally carried fuel, oils, pesticides, paints and other chemicals that you wouldn’t want mixed with your drinking water. The WaterWear is a collapsible backpack designed to overcome these problems.

The WaterWear pack allows those in developing countries to more easily transport water.

The result of a partnership between Greif, a manufacturer of industrial packaging products, and Impact Economics, the WaterWear pack holds up to 20 liters (5.3 US gal) of water. While this is much less than the 75.7 liter (20 gal) capacity Hipporoller, the collapsible backpack form factor makes the WaterWear pack easier to store and transport over uneven terrain.

Constructed from lightweight and durable industrial grade woven polypropylene, it features adjustable straps, a base that allows it to stand on its own while being filled, and a roll top that makes it easy to remove the liner for cleaning. There is also a protected spout on the rear of the pack to keep the water clean for drinking and hand washing. Read more

When we complain about the rain, other people will often say “Yeah, but it’s good for the plants.” Well, thanks to a microturbine-based system created by three students from the Technological University of Mexico, it’s now also being used to generate electricity for use in low-income homes.

The three young inventors of the Pluvia system, which uses rainwater runoff to generate electricity.

In a nutshell, the Pluvia system – developed by Omar Enrique Leyva Coca, Romel Brown and Gustavo Rivero Velázquez – uses the stream of rainwater runoff from houses’ rooftop rain gutters to spin a microturbine in a cylindrical housing. Electricity generated by that turbine is used to charge 12-volt batteries, which can in turn be used to power LED lamps or other small household appliances. Read more

Young Melbourne-based inventor Edward Linacre has won the 2011 James Dyson Award, making it the second year in a row where the prestigious prize has gone to an Aussie. Linacre stole this year’s competition with his Airdrop irrigation concept that collects water from thin air.

The Swinburne University of Technology design graduate was driven to transform an ancient cooling technique into a new sub-surface irrigation system, following the enduring Australian drought that saw high levels of farmer suicide along Australia’s Murray- Darling Basin. Read more

Audi is making a new fuel for internal combustion engines that has the potential to make a big dent when it comes to climate change – that’s because the synthetic diesel is made from just water and carbon dioxide.

The company’s pilot plant, which is operated by German startup Sunfire in Dresden, produced its first batches of the “e-diesel” this month. German Federal Minister of Education and Research Johanna Wanka put a few liters of the fuel in her work car, an Audi A8, to commemorate the accomplishment.

The base fuel is referred to as “blue crude,” and begins by taking electricity from renewable sources like wind, solar or hydropower and using it to produce hydrogen from water via reversible electrolysis. The hydrogen is then mixed with CO2 that has been converted into CO in two chemical processes and the resulting reactions produce a liquid made from long-chain hydrocarbons – this is blue crude, which is then refined to create the end product, the synthetic e-diesel. Read more