Gallery: Do-Gooder Turns Ferns Into Arsenic-Filtering Super System
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More than 70 million people in Bangladesh drink polluted water every day and one in five water wells have dangerous levels of arsenic, a metalloid that leads to high rates of infant mortality and cancer. *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
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U.S. Navy officer Stephen Goodwin Honan has developed a plant-based solution that can remove arsenic from drinking water using $10 worth of ferns. *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
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If the project continues to scale, Honan hopes the arsenic sequestered in the leaves of the plants can be extracted and sold to manufacturers. The arsenic in the plants is worth about $85 and would represent a life-changing income source to people who subsist on less than a dollar a day. *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
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The problem isn't confined just to the developing world. "Over 2 million Americans are unknowingly drinking arsenic-contaminated groundwater from their private wells," says Honan. "Raising awareness in the U.S. can help save lives domestically, and will bolster our cause abroad." *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
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There are two traditional ways to reduce arsenic in water supplies. Create a membrane and push water through it to screen out the impurities, creating toxic sludge in the process. Or, use chemicals to neutralize the heavy metals. Honan decided to solve the problem with ferns and a process called phytoremediation that uses plants to rapidly accumulate dangerous chemicals without the use of electricity and at a very low cost. *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
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Honan trained villagers to test drinking water well and set up purification systems for their neighbors, allowing them to make extra money in the process. *Photo: Stephen Goodwin Honan*
