Himalayan Large Area Purifier

Himalayan Large Air Purifier solution for “SwacchaMandu”

Description of the Event in brief:

The event was held in WWF office, Baluwatar. The event started at 2pm after the guests and mentor arrived at the hall. The program started with the presentation of the team members. Shambhavi Giri was the first speaker who introduced about the Team Asian Elephant and the main motive of their project. Then, mentor of the day Mr. Allen Bailochan Tuladhar gave his few words on inspiring youths to achieve their goals. Gaurav Adhikari presented about the product where he talked about the interesting facts about positive ions and negative ions. Trilochan Subedi shared the analysis report of the survey form which was survey few weeks ago. Then, Shreeya Karmacharya presented about how the LAP worked including the working mechanism too.  The presentation session was ended by Anjal Amatya by saying some of the limitations of the product and their future plans with the project. After the end of presentation session there was demo session of the product. The guests and team had question-answer session of the product. At the end the program ended with feedback and suggestions for the team and refreshment for attendees.

                        Guests in the event

The Team Asian Elephant 

Aim of :- “The Team Asian Elephant”.

Main motive of the team is to come together all 7 different colors as a team for a project.

What is the project of the Team Asian Elephant?

The project built by the team Asian Elephant is a unique solution for dust and smoke. The LAP helps to reduce dust particles and smoke in the air. Dust and smoke have become the major problems in Kathmandu that is why most of the people like to call “Dustmandu” or “Dhulo Mandu”. People are afraid to get out in the roads due to pollutions. As Kathmandu city has been listed as the 7th polluted city of the world. This can be a great opportunity to mitigate dust, smoke from the atmosphere and make the atmosphere fresh, clean and healthy again. Further more, this device can also help to control the burning issues of the world Global warming if this solution can be researched in depth. It is an ambitious project to solve one of the burning problem of the earth.

Picture source: https://thehimalayantimes.com/kathmandu/kathmandu-listed-as- 7th-most-polluted-city-in-world/

It can help to reduce the problem at the present to mitigate the dust problem in Kathmandu. The project has also carried out a survey among different people where most of the participants were students. The survey showed most of the people were affected negatively by the air pollution. The most of the affects that were seen included nose and ears irritations, skin problems, eye problems and lungs problems. The survey also included some lower solutions to prevent the problems such as Stay indoor, Use of mask, Cover the skin and others.

In the survey some people also suggested that to have air purifiers as a solution for fresh air in different places like:- Kalanki, Ratna park, Satdobato, Koteshwor, Chabahil, Balkhu and other chowks.

How does the device work?

How does Himalayan Large Air Purifier work? Is it rocket science? A trick or magic? Instead of jumping into the actual technicality. I would like to answer this question with three important points:

The Circuit………… Ionization of air……. And…. How does it actually clean the air?

First the circuit:- The structure we see is just what we see from the outside. The real deal is the circuit inside the casing. The circuit is a Cockcroft-Walton circuit. In simple words, it is a voltage multiplier. The input is 220 volt, yet the output is far greater. Theoretically, a single circuit can multiply an AC voltage or low pulsing DC to up to 10 kilo volt. Though this is not practically possible due to various resisting phenomenon. It uses multiple circuits such as these to multiply the effect of purification so as to cover a wider area. These voltage multipliers are commonly used in X-Ray machines, bug zappers, television sets, microwave ovens and photocopiers. The first ever use was actually in a particle accelerator which led to the development of Atom bomb.

So how does a circuit powerful enough to create an atomic bomb going to clean air? well, the high voltage produced by the circuit helps in the process called the IONIZATION OF AIR.

The IONIZATION OF AIR can be referred as charging the air electrically. Charge simply means gaining an electron or losing one. In the case for our purifier, air around it gains electrons thus charging it negatively.

For this to occur, LAP releases negative ions into the air. The atmosphere is made up of ions. There are positive as well as negative ions. The positive ions are good for health whereas the negative ions are the threats when the number of positive ions decreases becomes a threat to the world.

The first step is releasing the negative ions into the air. This is where our circuits actively participate.

LAP is given an input of 220V, which it converts to 4KV through several points. Each point is actually a needle that diffuses the air around it to charge it negatively. Now, the charged ions run through the air….

Seeking anything it can find except for air itself. Dust particles are mostly positively charged, thus become an easy point of attraction for the negative ions. The dust particles stick with the negative ions due to attraction at subatomic levels. From this it becomes clear that the most minute of the dust particles are attacked by the ions. This phenomenon also occurs with other air pollutants such as smoke, bacteria, odor and so on.

So the part here is done. With the ions attached to the dust particles. The dust particles get heavy and gravity does the work. The dust particles now settle down on the ground. The air above the ground slowly starts to be clearly visible.

Are there any limitations?

As every product have both positive as well as negative aspects in the same way this device also have some limitations such as:

• 4KV output is generated which is very high voltage and can be dangerous.
• Ozone as a byproduct is generated which is bad for health.
• It helps to reduce air pollution but not eradicate the pollution.

Brief detail about WWF Nepal and The Generation Green.

The World Wide Fund (WWF) started working in Nepal from 1967 when it launched a rhino conservation program in Chitwan. To keep up with the evolving face of conservation and environmental movement, WWF Nepal’s focus progressed from its localized efforts in conservation of single species in 1960s, integrated conservation and development approach in 1990s, to a new horizon of landscape level conservation encompassing national, regional and global scales of complexity in early 2000s.

The Generation Green is an ambitious five- year campaign (2014 - 2018) of WWF Nepal. Its main aim is to create a generation of Nepali youth, committed to sustainable development and biodiversity conservation that effectively engages and influences the wider stakeholders in conservation. It’s target is to reach out to half a million Nepali youth of age group 16 – 26 years.

Vision

WWF-Nepal envisions a prosperous Nepal with a society possessing an ethic of stewardship and responsibility towards nature.
By 2050 Nepal will have:

• Conserved biodiversity and the natural processes that sustain it in the Global 200 Ecoregions within Nepal.
• Established social and economic development patterns that assure the sustainable and equitable provision of natural goods and services, improving livelihoods and quality.
• Eliminated or mitigated critical threats to species, habitats, and ecological processes that derive from climate change, over exploitation of resources, unsustainable consumption, and pollution.

Mission

WWF-Nepal’s Mission is to stop the degradation of Nepal’s natural environment, and to build a future in which people live in harmony with nature by:

• Conserving biological diversity
• Ensuring the sustainable use of renewable resources
• Reducing pollution and wasteful consumption
• Addressing sustainable livelihoods

In brief

The generation green connects our local and national social leaders to the future ones to inculcate the exemplary leadership and success achieved by seasoned professionals. It also facilitates opportunities for youth to participate in sustainable development and conservation activities and build their empowerment in the process. The Generation Green has completed two batches of mentorship program, each lasting for a period of six months; has progressed with 165 Mentees with 16 mentors. The Generation Green believes that change starts from oneself. It puts the ‘I’ in initiative! The Generation Green is a mouthpiece platform for youth to speak out for the environment, for a change we want to see.

Posted: 08-17-2017 11:35 AM by Pradeep Shrestha with 1 comment(s)