[extrapickles]

It looks like the winner is a standard dehumidifier bolted to a standard biomass generator that has a condenser from a high efficiency furnace bolted on to it.

So the only "magic" they are doing is also capturing the water vapor from the generators combustion. While somewhat novel in combining it all, its all off the shelf tech.

What I don't like is the lack of good hard numbers in its performance in a range of conditions as snake oil is extremely common in the water from air industry.

[Digory]

The other magic is financial. My bet is that they assume free biomass. Once you assume input cost = $.00, things look easy.

And, to be fair, maybe this thing makes sense after a hurricane. There's lots of "free" biomass laying around in an area of extraordinary transportation costs.

But it's obviously not a solution to the "water problem" in rural, impoverished areas. You'd need to include the price of a renewable forest or palm plantation (for coconut shells), or the huge solar array.

[brixon]

Off the shelf tech might be what is keeping the cost down.