The phrase ‘urban innovation’ brings to mind huge cities, and smart buildings connected to smart modes of transport that use smart roads. Smog is not one of the things we see when we think of urban innovation; on the contrary, the vision represents a pollution-free place. Smog and poor-quality air would be a taboo subject, a song of the past. For such a vision of a clean city of the future to come true, we must deal with the current pollution crisis. That is what Daan Roosegaarde has been working on since 2015.
He came up with the idea of solving this problem during his visit to Beijing. Due to poor air quality and pollution, Daan was unable to appreciate the city. He then decided to look for a solution to urban pollution. This led him to the idea of building an smog free tower. He took his inspiration from home air fresheners. After 3 years, in 2018, the smog free towers stood in three countries. They suck in dirty air, filter it and return clean air. Daan’s plan is for his towers to be used on a global scale. India, a country that is struggling with a serious problem of smog in its cities, has already taken an interest in his idea.
Daan is not only a tech freak, but also an artist. His ideas include smart motorways and bicycles that provide drivers with purified air. However, the icing on the cake is what he is able to do with all the smog that his towers collect – diamonds.
This is no mistake, the team behind the smog free towers is able to make diamonds out of the collected impurities. It seems unlikely, but it is quite logical. At the atomic level, most of the impurities are simply coal, and diamonds are made from coal.
The smog free tower is basically a large vacuum cleaner. It draws in polluted air at the top and releases clean air at the bottom. This is made possible by nanotechnology based on copper coils that produce an electrostatic field literally separating pollution from the air. Coal and other materials are then collected by the team from the tower. Within an hour, one tower collects approximately 30,000 cubic metres of smoggy air. Importantly, they use energy from renewable sources. The towers are very efficient, purifying between 55 and 75% of the air around them. It is also important that they are not fixed in place, which means that they can be placed in different locations depending on the needs.
The collected impurities are treated under very high pressure for about 30 minutes to form diamonds. Each diamond with a size suitable, for example, for a ring, means 1,000 cubic metres of fresh air released into the atmosphere. The diamonds produced in this way also help to finance the whole project.
This allows us to combat air pollution by buying jewellery.
Source: https://venturecampus.com/en/jewellery-made-from-air-pollution/
