Yucatecan scientist obtains patent for unique seawater desalination system

Jorge Antonio Lechuga Andrade is a chemical engineer from Mérida, Yucatán, who has more than 30 years of professional experience. His work in the industry has led him to rethink the way of doing things, and that is how he came up with the idea of creating a water desalination machine which could also be 100 percent sustainable, and wouldn’t damage the environment.

After six years of hard work, Lechuga Andrade has managed to patent his project to desalinate seawater and turn it into pure, fresh drinking water.

Proud to be from Merida, the researcher and former director of the Faculty of Chemical Engineering of the Autonomous University of Yucatan (UADY), has managed to patent his invention not only in Mexico but also in the United States.

Before the patent is being granted, the project had to comply with certain tests and requirements on the system, basically to compare it with other similar devices existent in the market, in order to demonstrate its originality, innovation and sustainability.

The patents were granted by the Mexican Institute of Intellectual Property (IMPI) and by the United States Patent Office, both of which have a validity of approximately 20 years.

The system uses the technique of centrifugalreverse osmosis with “Dean vortexes” to desalinate seawater to make it drinkable, which makes it low cost, helps to save electricity and has a low impact on the environment.

Original image “Jorge Lechuga Andrade: desalinización sustentable del agua“, by Agencia Informativa Conacyt, used under CC BY 4.0 license, via Conacyt.

In the same way, the production costs are much lower, since the same system allows a systematic cleaning of the membranes, an action that in other systems must be done manually.

In addition, once the desalination process is finished, the surplus water is returned to the sea, in order to avoid the impact on marine flora and fauna.

The Mexican inventor’s Sustainable Water Desalinator offers many advantages compared to others, reason why in 2015 was awarded with the National Award of the Mexican Institute of Chemical Engineers.

Original image “Jorge Lechuga Andrade: desalinización sustentable del agua“, by Agencia Informativa Conacyt, used under CC BY 4.0 license, via Conacyt.