Graviky lab’s AIR-INK® is a promising solution to pollution!
Black Exhaust to Black Ink!
How does vehicular pollution look – Black, White, or Grey? And how much does it contribute to environmental pollution? Is there a solution to this pollution?
In India, air pollution is led by industries at 51%, followed by motor vehicles at 27%, then a disturbing 17% by burning agriculture waste and 5% by other sources. Work is in progress to either find sustainable energy alternatives or offset the carbon impact using other green technologies/activities.
Research to not only reduce vehicular pollution but also make use of it continues to date. As a result, many technological innovations to tackle air pollution have emerged in recent years. One such unique innovation is Graviky Lab’s AIR-INK®
Developed in India, this technology by Graviky labs follows the laws of conservation of energy by converting exhaust pollution into usable ink, making it a perfect circular economy.
How does this work?
Kaalink (derived from a Hindi word, ‘Kaali’ meaning black), a carbon-capturing device, is mounted at the end of the exhaust/tailpipe of a bike, a car, or a diesel generator. This device stores up to 95% of the pollutants coming out of the engines. Kaalink collects the particulate matter (PM) of carbon emissions – the Carbon Soot. Inhaling carbon soot can cause severe respiratory diseases such as asthma, lung cancer, and more.
In an experiment, fitting a Kaalink to an old Euro 3 car removed 45 minutes’ worth of emissions by filling a 30 ml container. The magnitude of pollution control that can be achieved on motor vehicles older than five years, diesel engines generators on a macro scale can be a gamechanger for the automotive and industrial pollution practices.
How significant is this AIR-INK®?
The innovation takes on both sides of the coin in one go. Not only does it curb air pollution, but it also provides a sustainable option for manufacturing ink for various industries. Conventionally, ink preparation involves two stages: mixing the solvent, resin and additives and adding necessary pigments to provide printability to the ink. By this process of making the best out of waste, ink can be produced for the packaging and printing industry, personal and commercial paper printing, sticky ink for plastic cards, apparel and automotive interiors, marker pens for artworks, etc.
Graviky Lab’s Air-Ink is not available for the public, yet. However, with some kick-starter programs, they have managed to clear about 1 trillion litres of air and collected more than 770 litres of ink!
With home-grown innovations like this, challenging the traditional approach of balancing carbon footprint, the right growth platforms should be built to not only help them reach the right market quickly but also promote more start-ups to come up with unique solutions as ‘From India, For the world’.
About the Author
Abhijeet Parmar, founder of Senergy Pallet Pvt. Ltd., is working to introduce Eco-friendly Logistics Pallets in Asia-Pacific Region. He aims to bring the focus on outstanding clean-tech startups of India. ‘It’s not just that we have a huge talent pool in our country, but it is also the need of the hour’, says Abhijeet..
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