What if you could produce drinking water without relying on a river, lake or mains water supply? Dutch start-up Solaq is developing a technology that extracts water from the air, helping to address one of this century’s greatest challenges: global water scarcity.
Solaq’s technology uses a process known as Atmospheric Water Generation (AWG). The system captures water vapour from the surrounding air and converts it into clean drinking water. Unlike many existing systems, which rely on energy-intensive cooling, Solaq uses a specialised hygroscopic liquid that absorbs moisture from the air. The captured water is then recovered through a thermal process and purified into drinking water.
“Water scarcity is no longer just a challenge for arid regions,” says founder Reuben Moore. “Climate change, population growth and ageing infrastructure are placing increasing pressure on the availability of clean water worldwide. Our goal is to create a new, reliable source of drinking water that can be deployed almost anywhere.”
A key advantage of the technology is that it operates independently of existing water infrastructure. This makes it suitable for remote locations, drought-prone regions and emergency situations where access to safe drinking water is limited. In addition, the system produces no wastewater and requires relatively little maintenance.
Solaq sees applications for governments, businesses and humanitarian organisations. The technology can support drinking water supplies as well as industrial processes that depend on a reliable source of water.
Solaq is a finalist for the WIS Award 2026. The final will take place on 26 October during the European Water Technology Week 2026 in Leeuwarden. The other finalists are CIWI, Deep, Flowless, Luper Technologies, Spectromarine and Versa Solution