The U.N. says we should be spending more than a hundred billion dollars on infrastructure to provide enough clean drinking water for everyone.

Leading researchers gathered in Brisbane to find solutions to do just that.

Jessica McGrath reports.

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Water is a basic human right, but one in ten people lack access to safe water.

Paul Bell, International Water Association: “Water is life, nothing happens without it and we are living in a time of unprecedented change, climate change, global population.”

More than four and a half thousand people are here for the week-long World Water Congress.

They’re hoping to meet the challenge of both conserving and finding new sources of H2O.

In less than ten years, half the world’s population of four billion people will be without sufficient drinking water.

In a world first, an Australian company, Atmos Blue is turning the air we breathe into water we can drink.

This small shipping container-sized innovation will change the face of disaster relief, drought and third-world countries.

It’s able to produce up to ten thousand litres of drinkable water per day with costs starting at as little as three dollars per thousand litres.

It’s also easily transported.

Atmos Blue plans to launch it in rural Australian stations – the driest, inhabited places on Earth.

Steve Batchelor, Atmos Blue: “With this technology there’ll be no such thing as a drought on these stations anymore.”

This glimpse of the future isn’t a mirage where a cool drink of water could always be on tap.

Jessica McGrath, QUT News.