On Jun 9, 2007, at 3:00 PM, Michel Jullian wrote:
Horace wrote:
... At local state well operator classes I've seen an actual
demonstration of a MIOX pocket pen run by AA batteries. The MIOX is
produced in the pen by electrolysis and then mixed with a much larger
volume of water to be decontaminated. The pen was produced for the
military.
Very clever indeed, one only needs 2 drops of household bleach to
potabilize 1 L of contaminated water so I can well imagine a pocket
device is enough for one man's drinking needs. Every person in the
third world should have one of those.
Yes, indeed. It would not even have to be pen small - a hand crank
or magnet shaking flashlight sized gadget would be better.
What are the electrodes made of, do you know? And what do you feed
it apart from AA batteries, just table salt?
It was some years ago so I can't trust my memory. I believe the big
commercial water treatment gadgets at the time used Pt anodes and a
Pt-Ni-something alloy cathode. I think the manufacturers rep said
they were testing some new cheaper alloys at the time, and the Pt was
a major expense problem for the big commercial technology. I'm sure
the pen produced MIOX though, not bleach, so the treated water did
not taste so much like chlorine/bleach, and it was more effective.
MIOX has a short lifetime, so it has to be generated at the time of
use. They could have just carried bleach in the pen, but it would
have been far less effective. The demonstration pen used water and
small salt tablets. I don't know where the technology is today.
Regards,
Horace Heffner
