Teens Create Bicycle-Powered Water Filtration System to Provide Safe Drinking Water

Kiona Elliot, 18

Payton Karr, 16

Hometown: Oakland Park, Florida

School: Northeast High School. Elliot will be attending the University of Florida in Fall 2013.

Favorite subject: Elliot’s favorite subject is environmental science. Karr enjoys chemistry.

Fun fact: In 2012, the young innovators and their team scored a $10,000 InvenTeam grant which supported the construction of the bicycle-powered emergency water-sanitation system. With the help of their community, the InvenTeam cohort, which is comprised of 14 members, was able to fundraise $17,000 to cover additional expenses such as travel and accommodations.

Natural disasters can cause horrific devastation, leaving behind mass destruction and many victims on their own in search of food and a clean water supply.  While brainstorming about an idea to submit for the Lemelson- MIT InvenTeam program grant, a pedal-powered filtration system was born.

One of the Northeast High School students in the program, Kalie Hoke, visited Haiti after the destructive 2010 earthquake and discovered how difficult it was to track down sanitary drinking water.

“We realized that we definitely wanted our project to be based upon [this] because, for us, it’s so easy to go to a kitchen or a bathroom sink to turn the tap and get water,” said Kiona Elliot, a senior at Northeast. “But in other countries people are dying because they don’t have the same privileges that we do with water.”

Representing a team of inventors who designed the bicycle-powered water filtration system, the young innovators–Elliot and Payton Karr– presented the device to President Barack Obama during the third Annual White House Science Fair, highlighting the student winners of a broad range of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) competitions from across the country, last April. Elliot and Karr were among the 100 students from more than 40 states present at the 2013 national science fair. Obama gave the bike, which provides 20-30 people with approximately a gallon of drinking water in a 15-hour period, a spin.

“He was excited that young people could be doing something that would impact the world in a great way,” said Karr.

BlackEnterprise.com spoke to the Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam participants about how the high-powered filtration system works, their passion for STEM and where the innovative duo will be in five years.

BlackEnterprise.com: How does the filtration system work?

Karr: The invention is powered by the bicycle, which has a hub-motor on the back which powers everything in the electrical box which includes a pump and two ozone generators.  Water is pumped from the initial holding tank that has a 100 and 200 micron mesh to filter out any large particles.  It’s pumped from that container into a second container through the electrical box which has an ozone generator to sanitize the water using ozone.  Once it gets into the second container, the second ozone generator diffuses the ozone throughout the container continuously to keep the water from being re-contaminated.

Elliot: The bicycle, not only does it convert kinetic energy to power our system, but it also can be used to transport our system because the entire thing is collapsible and can be placed into our box, which is actually designed after a pizza box.  It closes and bolts and the bike can then be hitched onto the container, and the container has two wheels on the side so that it can be transported easily to whatever area needed.

Given that Haiti was the inspiration for the filtration system, do you have plans to take your invention there?

Elliot: We’re actually trying to get our project patented and then sent to different areas that need it.  We’ve been trying to contact Red Cross about possibly using our invention and taking it to areas needed. We were contacted by a missionary group that takes trips to Haiti and they expressed their interest about possibly taking our invention with them on a mission trip to Haiti. We’re hoping it works out. There are just a couple of corrections we want to make with our invention to make it more easily available to missionary groups, so that they can take it with them.

When did you realize you were passionate about STEM?

Elliot: I think I speak for the both of us

when I say that we were interested in the field of science after we joined our teacher science research class, which most of our teammates were members of the class.  So I started my sophomore year, and I was able to conduct an independent research project. After that year I didn’t win anything, or do that well at regionals, but I fell in love with the whole process of having a problem and then trying to solve that problem–and making new discoveries in the field of science.  From there I conducted three different research projects and I really fell in love with the field of science.

Karr: I started research as a class in my freshman year in high school. Before that I had really liked science. Once I actually took the class and got to have my own independent project, and solved those problems, it really made it that much more interesting that I could study something that I was really interested in instead of just something that the teacher gave you.  That’s when my interest in science started.

Why do you feel it’s so important for young people to get involved in STEM?

Elliot: I think it’s important for young people to be involved in STEM, not because [of] the fact that it’s going to be where all the jobs come from in the future, but because it’s where all the

solutions for all the problems in the world are going to come from.  We need people who are going into the sci and the technological fields, and focus on problems in the world right now that they could use science to solve. I think that if more young people were involved in STEM, then I just think that there would be a better future because more solutions to different problems would be created.

Where do you see yourself in five years?

Elliot: I see myself working in environmental science and just using my research to solve other environmental issues in the world.  Whether it’s the lack of food that people have or the lack of clean water in the world, I really think that our main concern for the world right now is the environment. I’d like to help come up with solutions to make sure that everything is sustainable for the future.

Karr: In the next five years, I see myself in school still. After that, I would really hope to join a non-profit organization such as Peace Corps or Doctors Without Borders, or something where I can travel around to help other people when I am a doctor.

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