Ashok Gadgil (born November 15, 1950 in
Mumbai
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...
,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
)
Is the Andrew and Virginia Rudd Family Foundation Distinguished Chair and Professor of Safe Water and Sanitation at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
.
He is a Faculty Senior Scientist and has served as director of the Energy and Environmental Technologies Division at
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Gadgil specializes in heat transfer, fluid dynamics, and technology design for development. He has substantial experience in technical, economic, and policy research on energy efficiency and its implementation - particularly in developing countries.
Three of his best-known technologies for the developing-world are "UV Waterworks" (a simple, effective, and inexpensive disinfection system for drinking water), the "Berkeley-Darfur Stove" (a low-cost sheet-metal stove that saves fuelwood in
internally displaced person
An internally displaced person (IDP) is someone who is forced to leave their home but who remains within their country's borders. They are often referred to as refugees, although they do not fall within the legal definitions of a refugee.
...
's camps in
Darfur), and ECAR (ElectroChemical Arsenic Removal) for removing arsenic from water.
Gadgil advocates for immediate and strategic action on the part of the research community to apply current scientific knowledge to address world-wide issues relating to
climate change
In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...
.
Education
Gadgil holds a physics degree from the
University of Mumbai
The University of Mumbai is a collegiate, state-owned, public research university in Mumbai.
The University of Mumbai is one of the largest universities in the world. , the university had 711 affiliated colleges. Ratan Tata is the appointed h ...
, an M.Sc. in physics from
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
The Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (IIT Kanpur) Hindi: भारतीय प्रौद्योगिकी संस्थान कानपुर) is a public institute of technology located in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India. It was ...
, and an M.Sc. (1975) and Ph.D. (1979) in physics from the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
.
After completing his Ph.D. he spent 5 years working for a non-profit in India before returning to Berkeley.
Career
Gadgil Is the Andrew and Virginia Rudd Family Foundation Distinguished Chair and Professor of Safe Water and Sanitation at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
.
He also has been distinguished professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. At
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) Gadgil is a faculty senior scientist, and former director of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division
(2009–2015). From 2012 to 2022, Gadgil was the faculty director of the Development Impact Lab at UC Berkeley. He has taught graduate courses at UC Berkeley since 2006 addressing topics such as “Design for Sustainable Communities,” and “Technology and Sustainability”.
Gadgil has served as
editor of the journal ''
Annual Review of Environment and Resources
The ''Annual Review of Environment and Resources'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal that publishes review articles about environmental science and environmental engineering. It was first published in 1976 under the name the ''Annual Review of ...
'' since 2009.
Gadgil and
Paul Gertler were the founding editors of the Open Access journal ''Development Engineering'', first published by Elsevier in 2016.
In 1998 and again in 2006, Gadgil was invited by the Smithsonian Institution's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation to speak at the National Museum of American History about his life and work.
In September 2022, Springer published an Open Access graduate-level textbook Co-Edited by Gadgil, ''Introduction to Development Engineering: A Framework with Applications from the Field'', freely downloadable from the Springer website.
Research
Gadgil led a group of about 20 researchers at LBNL conducting experimental and modeling research in indoor airflow and
pollutant
A pollutant or novel entity is a substance or energy introduced into the environment that has undesired effects, or adversely affects the usefulness of a resource. These can be both naturally forming (i.e. minerals or extracted compounds like o ...
transport.
Most of that work was focused on reducing indoor radon concentrations in individual houses, and protecting office-building occupants from the threat of chemical and
biological attack
Biological warfare, also known as germ warfare, is the use of biological toxins or infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, insects, and fungi with the intent to kill, harm or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an act of war. Bio ...
s.
In early 1990s, he analyzed the potential for large utility-sponsored projects to promote energy efficient electric lighting in poor households in developing countries, then teamed up with others to design and demonstrate such projects. These have become commonplace in dozens of developing countries since 2000 onward, saving billions of dollars annually to their economies.
In recent years, he has worked on ways to inexpensively remove
arsenic
Arsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As and atomic number 33. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in combination with sulfur and metals, but also as a pure elemental crystal. Arsenic is a metalloid. It has various allotropes, ...
from groundwater used for drinking, and clean-burning biomass stoves, including design, production, and dissemination of the improved cookstoves for
Darfur (
Sudan)
refugees. Reducing the amount of fuel needed has helped to protect women from assault, for which they are at risk while foraging for fuel.
Gadgil has authored or co-authored at least 213 papers which are cited at least 3,805 times. He was elected a member of the
National Academy of Engineering
The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of ...
in 2013 for engineering solutions to the problems of potable water and energy in developing countries.
UV Waterworks
UV Waterworks uses the
UV light
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 PHz) to 400 nm (750 THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays. UV radiation i ...
emitted by a low-pressure mercury discharge (similar to that in a
fluorescent lamp
A fluorescent lamp, or fluorescent tube, is a low-pressure mercury-vapor gas-discharge lamp that uses fluorescence to produce visible light. An electric current in the gas excites mercury vapor, which produces short-wave ultraviolet ligh ...
) to disinfect drinking water. Effective disinfection at affordable cost is the primary and most important feature of UV Waterworks—allowing an entire system (including costs of pumps, filters, tanks, armpits, consumables, and employee salaries for operation) to sell drinking water at about 2 cents US for 12 liters even in deep rural areas, where personal incomes are commonly less than $1 US per day.
This business model, developed and implemented by WaterHealth International, makes safe drinking water affordable and accessible to even poor communities in developing countries. it provided safe drinking water for 26-29 million people in India and Africa.
For UV Waterworks, Gadgil received the Discover Award in 1996 for the most significant environmental invention of the year, as well as the Popular Science Award for "Best of What is New - 1996".
Darfur Stoves Project
The Darfur Stoves Project seeks to protect Darfuri women by providing them with specially developed stoves which require less firewood, hence decreasing women’s exposure to violence while collecting firewood and their need to trade food rations for fuel.
The stoves were developed with input from the women who would use them, enabling the designers to ensure that they would not tip over and that they would cook at an appropriate heat.
The Darfur Stoves Project is the first initiative of the nonprofit organization, Potential Energy. Gadgil is a co-Founder and served as Board Chair of Potential Energy till 2015. Potential Energy's mission is to adapt and scale technologies that improve lives in developing countries. The Darfur Stoves Project collaborates with international organizations such as Oxfam America
and the Sudanese organization, Sustainable Action Group (SAG).
As of 2018, Potential Energy had distributed over 40,000 stoves to women in Darfur, Sudan.
A single stove can last more than five years, saving 15-30% of a family's fuel costs, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by two metric tons per year.
ECAR
ECAR (ElectroChemical Arsenic Removal) is a simple technology for removing arsenic from drinking water
with a low-voltage electric current and iron electrodes. ECAR purifies water above WHO standards at a cost of about 0.08 cents per liter, and was tested in the field in West Bengal in 2012. In 2013, it was licensed by an Indian water company for further development.
Documentaries
Ashok Gadgil is featured in
Irena Salina's feature documentary ''
Flow: For Love of Water'' (2008)
and
Michael Apted
Michael David Apted, (10 February 1941 – 7 January 2021) was a British television and film director and producer.
Apted began working in television and directed the '' Up'' documentary series (1964–2019). He later directed '' Coal Miner's ...
's award-winning 1999 documentary ''Me and Isaac Newton''.
Awards (Selected List)
*2022, Director's Award from Berkeley Lab for Social Impact. For "design of the “DreamWarmer,” an innovative, non-electric infant warmer that uniquely addresses the challenges of resource-limited settings and has been proven to reduce ’all-cause’ infant mortality by a factor of three. "
*2022, Inaugural Laureate of the Zuckerberg Water Prize for "outstanding leadership, vision, innovation, and lasting global impact in the field of Water."
*2020, Honorable Mention,
Patents for Humanity Patents for Humanity is an awards program run by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
The Obama administration started the initiative in February 2012 to encourage new innovations to solve global development challenges.
2018 winners
* M ...
,
United States Patent and Trademark Office
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alex ...
, with
Vi Rapp, for inventing an infant-warming device that uses a phase-change material to indicate temperature.
*2017,
Curry Stone Design Prize
The Curry Stone Design Prize was an award given by the Curry Stone Foundation for innovative excellence in humanitarian design. The Prize comes with no restrictions, and is given to design practitioners at many scales, and includes those active in ...
. Inducted in the "Social Design Honoree Circle" of honorees of the
Curry Stone Foundation, for design under resource scarcity.
*2016, R&D100 Award, ''
R&D Magazine
Advantage Business Marketing (ABM) was a private American digital marketing and information services company owned by the venture capital firm Owner Resource Group. The company was founded in 2006 and was based in Rockaway, New Jersey, United Stat ...
'', for Sustainable and Affordable Fluoride Removal (SAFR) treatment of groundwater. The R&D100 Awards, called the “Oscars of Industrial Innovation”, are an international annual competition and celebrate the 100 top technology advances of the past year.
*2015,
Leo Szilard Lectureship Award
The Leo Szilard Lectureship Award (originally called the Leo Szilard Award) is given annually by the American Physical Society (APS) for "outstanding accomplishments by physicists in promoting the use of physics for the benefit of society". It is ...
of the
American Physical Society for "For applying physics to a variety of social problems and developing sustainable energy, environmental and public health technologies, as well as demonstrating how these could be scaled up, thus contributing to improved life for millions."
*2015, Foreign fellow,
Indian National Academy of Engineering
The Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE), founded in 1987, comprises India's engineers, engineer-scientists and technologists covering the entire spectrum of engineering disciplines.
The Academy is registered under the Societies Reg ...
(INAE)
*2014, Inducted in
National Inventors Hall of Fame
The National Inventors Hall of Fame (NIHF) is an American not-for-profit organization, founded in 1973, which recognizes individual engineers and inventors who hold a U.S. patent of significant technology. Besides the Hall of Fame, it also oper ...
*2013,
Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz International Prize for Water—Creativity category—team award
*2013, Inducted in the US
National Academy of Engineering
The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of ...
*2013, Laureate (Economic Development),
The Tech Awards
The Tech Awards (expanded in 2016 to The Tech for Global Good) is a program of The Tech Interactive (previously The Tech Museum of Innovation) wherein innovators from any country are recognized for technological contributions which benefit the ...
, Team award for the Berkeley-Darfur Stove
*2012,
Lemelson-MIT Prize Award for Global Innovation
*2012, Zayed Sustainability Prize Individual category
*2011.
European Inventor Award
The European Inventor Award(formerly European Inventor of the Year Award, renamed in 2010), are presented annually by the European Patent Office, sometimes supported by the respective Presidency of the Council of the European Union and by the Eur ...
with Vikas Garud,
European Patent Office
The European Patent Office (EPO) is one of the two organs of the European Patent Organisation (EPOrg), the other being the Administrative Council. The EPO acts as executive body for the organisation , for UV water disinfection device
*2009, The 15th Annual
Heinz Award
The Heinz Awards are individual achievement honors given annually by the Heinz Family Foundation. The Heinz Awards each year recognize outstanding individuals for their innovative contributions in three areas: the Arts, the Economy and the Enviro ...
with special focus on the environment
*2007, Breakthrough Award by ''
Popular Mechanics
''Popular Mechanics'' (sometimes PM or PopMech) is a magazine of popular science and technology, featuring automotive, home, outdoor, electronics, science, do-it-yourself, and technology topics. Military topics, aviation and transportation o ...
''—for Berkeley-Darfur Stove
*2004. Laureate (Health),
The Tech Awards
The Tech Awards (expanded in 2016 to The Tech for Global Good) is a program of The Tech Interactive (previously The Tech Museum of Innovation) wherein innovators from any country are recognized for technological contributions which benefit the ...
, for UVWaterworks
*2001,
Fellow of the American Physical Society
*1996, "Best of What's New" Award, ''
Popular Science'' magazine, for UV Waterworks
*1996, Discover Award, ''
Discover
Discover may refer to:
Art, entertainment, and media
* ''Discover'' (album), a Cactus Jack album
* ''Discover'' (magazine), an American science magazine
Businesses and brands
* DISCover, the ''Digital Interactive Systems Corporation''
* D ...
'' magazine for UVWaterworks
*1991, Pew Fellowship in Conservation and the Environment,
The Pew Charitable Trusts
The Pew Charitable Trusts is an independent non-profit, non-governmental organization (NGO), founded in 1948.
With over 6 billion in assets, its stated mission is to serve the public interest by "improving public policy, informing the public, a ...
References
External links
Gadgil's Research Lab websitePersonal Website Short biography from
MIT Press
The MIT Press is a university press affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (United States). It was established in 1962.
History
The MIT Press traces its origins back to 1926 when MIT publish ...
. Text adapted from ''Inventing Modern America.''
Prototype Online: Inventive Voices podcast featuring a two-part interview with Ashok Gadgil- From the Smithsonian's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation website.
Potential Energy Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gadgil, Ashok
1950 births
Living people
Indian emigrants to the United States
UC Berkeley College of Engineering faculty
University of California, Berkeley alumni
Scientists from the San Francisco Bay Area
European Inventor Award winners
Articles with imported dually licensed text
20th-century American inventors
21st-century American inventors
American academics of Indian descent
Fellows of the American Physical Society
Annual Reviews (publisher) editors
Indian American