Professor publishes new book on drinking water treatment

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
Contact:
Chittaranjan Ray, (808) 956-9652
Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering
C. S. Papacostas, (808) 956-6538
Professor & Chair, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Posted: Aug 1, 2011

Chittaranjan Ray, Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Interim Director of the Water Resources Research Center at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa,  co-edited a new book entitled “Drinking Water Treatment: Focusing on Appropriate Technology and Sustainability” with Ravi Jain, Dean of Engineering and Computer Science at the University of the Pacific.

Published by Springer, this 262-page book focuses on four treatment technologies, namely solar pasteurization, membrane desalination, riverbank filtration as a natural filtration method, and solar distillation for drinking water production. 

The book begins with a comparative analysis of various water treatment technologies and subsequently addresses the details of the four treatment techniques. Finally, it provides a trans-disciplinary analysis of differing views of the concept of sustainability and highlights technology transfer possibilities and implementation procedures.

Solar pasteurization, solar distillation, and riverbank filtration are low cost technologies with differing scales of implementation that are most suited to developing regions of the world. While solar pasteurization and solar distillation are ideal for household units, riverbank filtration is applicable to the scale of towns or cities. The chapter on membrane desalination emphasizes the processes involved, addresses their environmental impacts and mitigation strategies, and finally discusses the potential of membrane desalination applications to small- and medium-scale treatment systems.

"We are always pleased to see the work of our faculty being published, " said C. S. Papacostas, Professor and Chair of the Civil & Environmental Engineering Department. "It increases the likelihood that the work will find global application and ultimately benefit both the environment and humanity."