Baylor University has partnered with four Department of Energy laboratories and more than a dozen universities in a research alliance to address the nation’s water security issues through desalination and will share in a $100 million grant funding the project for five years. The National Alliance for Water Innovation (NAWI) is a public-private partnership headquartered at Berkeley Lab and includes Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, 19 founding university partners—including Baylor University—and 10 founding industry partners.

NAWI’s goal is to enable the manufacturing of energy-efficient desalination technologies in the United States at a lower cost with the same (or higher) quality and reduced environmental impact for 90 percent of non-traditional water sources within the next 10 years. As a DOE innovation hub, NAWI will conduct research and also develop a road map to prioritize the highest impact technology options, then identify and solicit projects to support those priorities.

Amanda S. Hering is the site director of the Baylor team. She does research in the area of statistics as applied to environmental and engineering problems related to water. Her connection to NAWI began more than two years ago based on her work in data-driven automation of decentralized wastewater treatment facilities with her environmental engineering colleagues at Colorado School of Mines. She is pictured below with graduate students during a visit to Oak Ridge National Laboratory for the NextGen planning workshop in preparation for the DOE proposal.