Techie Tuesday: Desert Cooler

Just add water! 

No wires or electricity just a good use of evaporation and the laws of thermodynamics make this a life altering technology for some.

Muhammed Bah Abba is the inventor

The idea he hit on was that of putting his grandmother's traditional craft, pottery, to a new use. If you put two pots one inside the other and insulate the space between them, then vegetables in the inner pot can be kept cool and last longer. This is the desert cooler.

It took him two years to develop the idea and answer related questions. Where were the pots best kept and what lasted best inside them? What was to be the insulator between the two pots? He tried foam out of an old mattress but finally decided on wet river sand. This not only insulated the inner pot the evaporation of water from the sand also cooled it.

This would perfect for Burning Man or to replace the ol' Styrofoam cooler. Just a trip to the garden center for some pots and some sand...