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INNOVATION
BioReNEW, Inc.
BioReNEW, Inc. is a University of South Florida (USF) start-up company dedicated to improving world sanita-
tion problems by using microbes to break down waste. Developed by Dr. Daniel Yeh, associate professor of civil
and environmental engineering at USF and his team, the company’s patented NEWgenerator technology gener-
ates nutrients, energy, and water by safely recovering them from wastewater without being hooked up to sewer
lines. The system is paired with a device with a sewage tank, like a portable toilet. The battery-run generator
pulls waste and wastewater from the tank and then runs it through a membrane-based cleaning filter. That
draws out nutrients as well as water that is then chlorinated for future toilet flushing. Yeh is the principal investi-
gator of a newly-awarded two-year $1.14 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for this innova-
tive technology. Yeh and USF postdoctoral researcher Dr. Robert Bair will soon install a new and improved
version of the NEWgenerator in Durban, South Africa, and will begin field testing with their partners at the
University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, in early 2018. They are one of four crews selected by the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation to develop technologies called Reinvented Toilets that help solve water and sanita-
tion problems in Durban and worldwide. Yeh’s NEWgenerator technology has been the recipient of several
awards, including a $50,000 prize from the Cade Museum in Florida, a previous $100,000 grant from the Bill
& Melinda Gates Foundation in 2011, and a $200,000 award from the government of India, where the innova-
tive technology is being field tested in the coastal city of Trivandrum.
More information can be found at:
BioReNEWinc.com
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