Billboards could do more than just advertise, if scientists at the University of Engineering and Technology (UTEC) in Peru have their way. While UTEC's earlier billboard produced drinkable water, its latest creation scrubs the air free of pollutants. According to the team, a single billboard can do the work of 1,200 trees, purifying 100,000 cubic meters (3.5 million cubic feet) of air daily in crowded cities. The University has installed its first air-purifying billboard near a construction zone in Lima, a city that's famous for having the worst air quality in all of South America. The billboard works by combining polluted air with water, using basic thermodynamic principles to actively dissolve the pollutants (such as bacteria, dust and germs) in water to release fresh air. The scientists claim that their billboard filtered 489,000 cubic meters of air within one week in March, scrubbing it free of 99 percent of its airborne bacteria. The effects of the billboard can be experienced, the team says, within a 5-block radius, benefiting both construction workers and the area's residents. The extracted pollutants are held for analysis, presumably with a view to creating more effective billboards in the future.
The original article in Spanish from UTEC has not been translated into English as of the time of this writing.
[Editor's Note: the 100,000 and 489,000 figures are copied verbatim from the second linked article.]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Angry Jesus on Wednesday May 07 2014, @05:07PM
The article explains that the original water-generating billboards required no electricity, but these air scrubbing versions need 2.5KW which is roughly the same amount of power as a small residential central air conditioner. The article focuses on using these around construction sites, I was hoping to see more of a discussion about clean-up of long-term smog. Like making every billboard along a freeway into a scrubber in order to capture most of the tailpipe emissions from cars on the freeway.
(Score: 2) by hubie on Thursday May 08 2014, @12:39AM
So I guess you need to plug this billboard into a two-cycle generator for it to work.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Silentknyght on Wednesday May 07 2014, @05:21PM
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday May 07 2014, @06:44PM
So WHY is it a billboard? Do they need that much area exposed to the environment for it to function?
Are they using an electrostatic charge to attract particles?
Wet scrubbers don't seem to require this, according to your link.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday May 07 2014, @06:54PM
Thanks to this, someone will argue that to depollute my lungs I need yet mroe visual pollution.
.
I can see how the ad would pay for the cost of the billboard, but maybe tackling the pollution source would be a lot more rational, unless we want every street to look like times square...
(Score: 1) by islisis on Wednesday May 07 2014, @09:50PM
but what is the point of living long on clean air if your eyes and mind can't be harvested to work for society?