The Water Crisis Hidden in the LA Fires
Every year, California faces a brutal cycle of wildfires, but this time, the stakes are higher than ever. The Palisades and Eaton Fires have destroyed over 12,000 homes, burned 40,000 acres, and displaced 100,000 people. But beyond the visible destruction, there’s another crisis unfolding—one that remains largely unseen: the failure of our water infrastructure.
In this episode of Liquid Assets, we sit down with Reuben Vollmer, CEO and Co-Founder of Spout Water, to discuss how California’s water mismanagement played a pivotal role in fueling these wildfires—and how it’s now impacting the drinking water of thousands. With fire hydrants running dry, plastic pipes melting into the water supply, and entire communities left with "do not drink" advisories, we explore the connection between fire, climate change, and water security.
Reuben shares his personal experience of being evacuated due to the fires and the devastating loss of not just homes but the memories tied to them. He explains how a decade in the water industry led him to develop Spout, an innovative device that pulls clean drinking water from the air, offering an alternative for those who can no longer rely on traditional water infrastructure.
We also dive into the controversial use of fire retardants—why they're necessary, but how they may also be accelerating the growth of invasive species, setting the stage for even bigger fires in the future. And, as bottled water shortages rise, Reuben unpacks why one in five Americans already rely on bottled water and what that means for our environment.
What you'll hear in this episode:
- Why LA’s fires are bookended by water mismanagement—from drought-driven fuel loads to water contamination post-fire
- The shocking reality of fire hydrants running dry and the melting water system polluting local drinking water
- How fire retardants may be unintentionally fueling future fires
- The hidden costs of bottled water and why its overuse is creating an environmental crisis
- The science behind Spout, a device that generates pure drinking water from the air
- How Reuben’s personal story of water scarcity inspired his mission to make clean water accessible to all
Listen On:
📺 Watch the Interview
Meet Reuben
A decade ago, Reuben Vollmer was working in creative technology and rapid prototyping, designing solutions for Fortune 500 companies. But a single letter in the mail changed his path forever. His parents, who ran a small olive farm outside of Los Angeles, were suddenly told that their water rights had been cut off due to the drought. That moment sparked an obsession: Could water be created where it’s needed most, without relying on failing infrastructure?
After witnessing the natural formation of dew on grass, Reuben set out to build a device that could generate clean drinking water from thin air. Ten years later, that idea became Spout—a sleek, consumer-friendly atmospheric water harvester that produces up to 2.5 gallons of fresh water daily using only air and electricity.
Now, with climate change making water access increasingly fragile, Reuben is on a mission to give people control over their water supply—eliminating reliance on plastic bottles, old pipes, or failing municipal systems.
The Book, Movie, or Show
"Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism" by Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche is Ruben recommendation as this book transformed his perspective on leadership and personal growth. The book explores how spirituality can sometimes become an ego-driven pursuit and how to break free from that trap. For Ruben, meditation and mindfulness have been essential in navigating the pressures of entrepreneurship and keeping his mission focused on real-world impact.
📖 Contains affiliate Amazon links.
Transcript
00:00
Reuben Vollmer
These structures burn. It's. It's not just matter that's being destroyed, it's. It's memories. I mean, it's incredibly tragic and it's been really hard to watch what's going on in la, but I also think it's, you know, it's tragic and it's fascinating to me because we've never experienced anything like this before in the history of the city. So this is by far the most devastating event I've ever seen in my lifetime. And whenever you have your water rights threatened, or you turn on the tap and there's no water, or you get a boil water advisory, that changes you forever. I meet people all the time who have had their water threatened at some point or gotten sick from their water, and it changes how they look at water. Already, one in five Americans is living off of bottled water, which is actually truly horrifying.
00:53
Ravi Kurani
Welcome to Liquid Assets. Liquid Assets is a podcast that talks about the intersection of management policy and business, all as it looks at the world of water.
01:02
Ravi Kurani
I'm your host, Ravi Kurani, and today we have one of my really good friends and an awesome individual, Reuben Vollmer.
01:09
Reuben Vollmer
Hey, I'm Reuben Vollmer, the CEO and co-founder of Spout Water. I've been in water for 10 years developing this product, which is able to create up to two and a half gallons of fresh drinking water a day from the air. So wherever you want your own source of pure water, you can plug in our device and have it.
01:26
Ravi Kurani
Ruben, how are you doing today?
01:28
Reuben Vollmer
I'm doing okay. I'm doing okay. How are you?
01:31
Ravi Kurani
I'm doing good. I'm doing. Doing all right. I'm down here in Southern California right now, down in Riverside. I know you are not right. You're in. You're in Guatemala.
01:41
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, I'm actually. Yep, yep. I was on a trip and then the fires broke out and we got evacuated, so we had nothing to go back to. Unfortunately, we're in a small house in Topanga and we haven't had access for the last, I think, coming up on 10 days. So.
01:58
Ravi Kurani
Oh, my gosh.
01:58
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, we just ended up staying here and it's been really hard to watch what's going on in la, but I also think it's, you know, it's tragic and it's fascinating to me because we've never experienced anything like this before in the history of the city. So this is by far the most devastating event I've ever seen in my lifetime.
02:20
Ravi Kurani
So. So sorry to hear that, Reuben. Yeah, I was Born and raised in Southern California as well. So not, not in la, not in Topanga, but definitely have a connection to the area. And so deeply sorry for, for what Los Angeles is going through. I know there is a water conversation to be had in the LA fires. Just for the listeners out there, it's January 14, 2025. So just to kind of set some context, the LA fires currently have the Palisades fire and the Eaton fire, which is what Ruben is talking about. And Reuben, I'll just kind of leave you with that. I know it's very topical for now right now, and water does have a very deep connection with the fires that are happening. So I'll just, I'll kind of let you take it from there.
03:09
Ravi Kurani
I know were chatting a little bit before, so I'll let you jump in with that.
03:13
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, thanks. So again, just to kind of level set, like ravi said, It's January 14, 2025, and as of today, more than 12,000 homes, businesses and schools have been destroyed by the fire, which is crazy. It's super tragic. Over 40,000 acres have been burned across the several fires that have broken out in Los Angeles. And at least 24 people have died and 100,000 people have been evacuated. So this is like huge. I mean, I, I know several people whose houses have burned down. My favorite restaurant burned down, which is. It's odd. Odd. Just like all the memories I have in this place and then it's gone. I know that's nothing compared to losing a home, but it is a very, very strange feeling. It's almost like somebody died. I mean, like people are dying on, obviously, but when these structures burn, it's.
04:07
Reuben Vollmer
It's not just matter that's being destroyed, it's. It's memories. I mean, it's incredibly tragic. And what I think is interesting is that obviously most of the coverage is on the fire. That's what's very bright and loud and destructive. But also since I've been in water for about 10 years, studying it with starting my own company, what I think is interesting is that I see that this fire story is really bookended by water. This fire broke out because of a mismanagement of water, and then it's being put out by the proper use of water in a way. But then it's also leading to a lot of other tragic things.
04:50
Reuben Vollmer
Like for instance, right now, tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles don't have access to drinking water in their home, whether because their home burnt down or because apparently the water system is melting and releasing chemicals into the drinking water, which is horrifying. So a lot of people have either boil water advisories right now or do not drink advisories, which I've actually never heard of that happening, especially in a large city like Los Angeles. So, yeah, so I think it's really interesting to kind of analyze this fire from the water's perspective. And again, like, things like, you know, we're in a drought. It hasn't rained significantly in Los Angeles in 10 months, which is, again, insane. We've got hydrants running dry. A lot of people are questioning what is in the chemicals that are dropping to put out the fire.
05:46
Reuben Vollmer
Like, when you see that bright red stuff coming out of the plane, people are questioning, like, is that going to end up in our water? How is that going to affect nature? So there's a lot of things that I'd love to kind of get into on a deeper level, but I also want to kind of, you know, tell the listeners that I got into water because my parents had their water rights threatened by the state of California 10 years ago. So they had a small farm outside of Los Angeles, a small olive farm, and they got a letter in the mail saying, oh, by the way, we're in a drought, so don't count on having access to the water that you're using to grow your trees. And at that time, I was working as a creative technologist.
06:28
Reuben Vollmer
I was doing rapid prototyping fortune 500 companies. And like, literally the next day, I was walking my dog and I noticed dew on a grassy field. And I thought, why don't I build a prototype to capture the water that's being created there? Because it looks like nature is just creating water right where it's needed. And there's obviously no pipes or bottles that are leading to the creation of dew water. So that's when I really got into developing atmospheric water harvesters, water generators to actually create drinking water from the air right where it's needed, instead of relying on the government or infrastructure or big corporations to deliver plastic bottled water. So, again, I'm, you know, I'm just a citizen who's totally fascinated by water and by the water infrastructure and industry. And I've been watching it very closely.
07:22
Reuben Vollmer
So I just would love to share today, like, some of my insights and what I'm seeing and maybe how we can change the story in the future.
07:29
Ravi Kurani
Yeah, there's a ton to unpack there. Ruben, thanks. Thanks a ton for. For kind of laying that out. I want to. I want to Rewind the tape a little bit and let's go back to the California fires really quick. You had mentioned that the story of the fire is bookended by water. Yeah. By California being in a drought, by obviously a lot of rain also pouring in the last few years. And then water being a very pivotal part on how the fire is fought. On top of also the access to clean drinking water because of this boil your water or don't drink advisories because the water system is literally melting. Let's just kind of take that storyline from the beginning. Right. Like why did the fires happen? You had mentioned the drought, you'd mentioned a lot of rain. Let's just.
08:16
Ravi Kurani
Can you, can you kind of just of timeline wise, walk us through why are we here, where we're at, and what's. What's kind of the reason that led to that.
08:26
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, so basically I've been doing obviously a lot of research around this and it seems like there's this phenomena that they're calling weather whiplash, where we have like a lot of rain and then no rain for longer and longer periods of time. So just last winter in 2024, we had more rain than we've had in a long time, which caused actually a lot of landslides to happen, a lot of road closures. A lot of the California coastline fell into the ocean actually because of the crazy rains. So we had a ton of water and then all of a sudden, no water. So all the plants that got to grow with the water weren't able to grow, live and survive through the rest of the year. So they died and dried out, which created this perfect firestorm for this fire to happen again.
09:20
Reuben Vollmer
It's been 10 months since Los Angeles has seen significant rainfall and. Yeah, so. And again, I'll go more into that in a little bit, talking about forest management and what's been happening there. But I also want to bring up this other really unique thing that I've seen and known about for a long time. But basically with global warming, since the planet is heating up, the air can actually hold more water vapor. So it actually pulls more moisture from the ground and from plants and puts it into the air. So for every 1 degree centigrade that the temperature increases, the atmosphere can hold 7% more water vapor. So, and that may not sound like much, but that is incredibly significant, especially since it's not just the temperature isn't just increasing 1 degree across the planet all at once.
10:09
Reuben Vollmer
There's some places where it's increasing by 10, some places where it's going down a little bit, but so we have these different regions that, where if it's a little bit warmer, the plants in the ground have less moisture in it, which again leads these fire conditions. So, yeah, so that's kind of the perfect storm that's led us to what's happened in the last week or two. But there's some other culprits which I'll get into. So basically like land management in terms of how we are able to manage our forests. So there's some plants that are actually fire resistant. There's California native plants that don't burn so easily and they don't need much water.
10:56
Reuben Vollmer
But those plants don't get to live and really thrive because there's so many invasive species that are stealing the water away from these plants that could actually help prevent these fires. So I think it's called like cheatgrass, which essentially is a, is an invasive species that again, is stealing up to 15% of the water. Like in the Sierra Nevadas, they did a study and found that this, that the invasive species were sucking 15% of the water out of the whole ecosystem. And then again they die and then they burn a lot easier because they're invasive. So they're not used to getting through fires. So another thing that's really interesting is that we could actually be creating green breaks, which as far as I know, we're not doing or doing very little of. So instead of a.
11:43
Reuben Vollmer
When, when you think of a traditional fire break where they just will clear away all the brush to leave dirt, if you have a green break, you're using these fire resistant plants to stop the flow of the fire. And we're not really doing much of that because it's really difficult to get water to these locations, which, again, I'll talk about later, but I think that's a really fascinating solution, but that just hasn't been implemented. So. Yeah. Any questions at that point?
12:16
Ravi Kurani
No, I think that makes sense. And if I was just to kind of summarize that back for the audience. I love this terminology of kind of weather whiplash. Right. We got a lot of rain. Plants basically grew because of that. We didn't get rain. The plants couldn't survive and then died and became fuel for what was the fire or what is the fire and exacerbated by that. From a land management standpoint, there was a number of things that we could have done. You know, I like this, green breaks. You know, you see the firefighters doing that by clearing out the brush, like you said a lot of that obviously wasn't done because of the invasive species against what are native species.
13:00
Ravi Kurani
And so the native species could help in fire remediation, but because we have a lot of invasive species there, they're basically taking the food, they're taking the water away from the native species, which is then exacerbating this issue even more.
13:15
Reuben Vollmer
Exactly. Yeah. So I think it's fascinating. Yeah.
13:19
Ravi Kurani
If we kind of take and box all that up and then say, okay, well, now we are at this point where we have this perfect storm of ingredients that can start this fire. You're seeing the fire happening now in the news where we're obviously fighting it. Can you talk a little bit about water's role in fighting the fires? You had mentioned this kind of red stuff that's inside of, of the, of the liquid that they're dropping. I actually don't even know what that is. I would love to talk about that as well. And then we'll kind of pause there. And I'd love to kind of end cap this with what's happening to the water because of the fires. Right. You had talked about do not drink, boil your water. We'll keep that for later.
14:01
Ravi Kurani
But let's go ahead and kind of zoom in on this part on like water and its relation to the firefighting.
14:06
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah. So I just want to start off with the most shocking thing, which is that there was hydrants that didn't have any water coming out of them, which I imagine is a fireman's worst nightmare. I mean, I literally actually cannot imagine what that's like to like, be in a place in front of an active fire, hook up your hose and then not have any water come out. And the reason for that, just because I think that's the most shocking thing to start with, is that so when the houses burn, their water lines burn too, which can lead to tremendous water leaks in the whole system.
14:38
Reuben Vollmer
And then when you're firefighting up in a hill and you're firefighting at the bottom of the hill, the pressure drops so much that the water doesn't have enough pressure to get to the top of the hill to fight those fires. You know, unfortunately, it's become very politicized. I'm not pointing any fingers. This is a super tragic, you know, series of events that have led to this happening. And I'm hoping that the next time that there's a fire where it, you know, many more steps ahead than where we're at right now. But yeah, so regarding the fire Returns looked into this as well. It's really interesting. Well, because what I was afraid of, what I heard initially, because there's again, so many rumors on social media right now, it's really hard to figure out what's real and what's not.
15:22
Reuben Vollmer
But I did some pretty deep research. And again, my, what I first heard was that they were dropping PFAS chemicals like these really toxic fire retardant chemicals on the land. And that was, I mean, PFAS never leaves your body. It's a horrifying chemical. It's already in 70% of the water in our cities. So to imagine them dropping it on a fire just doesn't make any sense and would be like a very strange and tragic thing to do. But it turns out that at least according to the officials, the fire retardants that they're dropping now is mostly ammonium phosphate, which is actually a very common fertilizer. And basically there's a chemical reaction that happens when you drop the ammonium phosphate on plants that reacts with their cellulose to create. Well, to stop the plants from actually creating volatile gases.
16:16
Reuben Vollmer
So that makes sense to some degree. And it's red because they put iron oxide in it so they can see where they've dropped it. It's not red because of some crazy chemical that they're putting in there, which again, I thought was very interesting. But again, if you go another step further, it's like, okay, they dropped this stuff on the plants. It can definitely help slow the fires down or stop them. But if we're talking about issues with invasive species that are causing these fires, really, and then you drop fertilizer on the same place where those invasive species grow. And then to boot, they're putting this fire retardant on places that are the most difficult to get to physically. So they're the most difficult places to fight fires.
17:06
Reuben Vollmer
I think we have another perfect storm of again, having a lot of invasive species now that we've put fertilizer on, which again next year will help those species grow even more and could potentially block out light or steal water from the native species. And so, and when I was like probing, like, doesn't this add up like that? There's not really a lot of research I could find that connects those dots, which again is weird. But that's just where we're at. I mean, again, like, looking at this whole situation, it seems like this is a very antiquated system. Again, I have so much respect for the firefighters and everyone is putting their lives on the line to stop these fires. And I don't blame them at all. I truly believe that they're doing their very best to put these fires out 100%.
17:52
Reuben Vollmer
But I also see that there's not much innovation in this space in the last, you know, really 40 years, 50 years maybe, I think, because the fires are very tragic when they happen. They grab the news headlines for a week or two and then that's it. And there's probably investors just don't see a lot of money in fire prevention or investing in firemen or any of those organizations, which is, again, tragic. I wish we could have Silicon Valley behind this problem to figure out better solutions than dropping fertilizer on places full of invasive species. So, you know, and then also just one other part of this is that people are concerned about the ammonium phosphate getting into our water supply.
18:43
Reuben Vollmer
And realistically, like, the amount of this chemical that they're dropping compared to the enormity of the amount of water that, that occurs when it rains is going to be insanely diluted. So it's not something I'm particularly concerned about, you know, and there's actually very few studies done on how it affects nature. They definitely test it a lot, but they don't look at how it affects nature over the course of many years. But again, I, I'm grateful that it exists in general right now because it's definitely having a huge impact on the fire, these fire retardants. But also I'd love to call on investors in Silicon Valley to come up with new solutions that are undoubtedly better. You know, whether that's just the forest management part of it or developing green breaks.
19:37
Reuben Vollmer
Ideally we don't have to drop fire retardants on fragile ecosystems, best case scenario. But I know we're not there yet, but I think there's many thousands of people who would like to see other options.
19:51
Ravi Kurani
Really interesting. Ruben, let's go ahead. And now actually move over to the impact of fires on the water system. And you had mentioned this kind of boil your water, do not drink. Really interesting that the water and the piping is actually melting.
20:09
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah.
20:09
Ravi Kurani
And, and all those chemicals are obviously going into the supply stream. Kind of. My first question that hits me is the implications of this just isolated to kind of the Palisades Topanga area or, I mean, water travels across the region. Right. Is, is this water also affecting the greater LA area? If you're down in like Huntington beach or you're, you know, 50, 60, 70 miles away, within the state of California. Like, how far does this issue actually reach?
20:40
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, so the crazy thing is that we don't know. Again, since I have a lot of experience testing water over many years, I'll tell you one thing about water testing that's incredibly frustrating is that it takes a lot of time. So you have to collect a sample, mail it to a laboratory, take some time to test it, take some time to analyze results. Most of the time, if it's a good test, they'll double test it to make sure that there's nothing that's triggered the sensor that shouldn't. So it's a very time consuming process to test water. So because this happened in the last week and then everybody's like going crazy because they've either been evacuated or the freeways are shut down. We don't, I don't see any of that like happening.
21:27
Reuben Vollmer
Like the testing happening very quickly are fast enough to know exactly where the issues are. So it's just, it's a very strange time, very tragic time. And it's a, we don't know. Again, like I'm saying is that we don't know how far it's affected the water system. But I mean, for sure, again, I mean, tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles are again either under a boil water advisory or do not drink advisory. And we don't really know how far that should be stretched out those advisories because we haven't tested enough. There's obvious places where they have open air reservoirs that are full of ash now and probably fire retardants and all the chemicals from, you know, burning houses. I mean, it's just really tragic and disgusting to even talk about that. This is a situation that we're in.
22:20
Reuben Vollmer
But again, open air reservoirs, like they know that the people who are getting that water for sure should not drink the water. They know that certain places where they have plastic pipes close to the surface of the streets, that those places could have contamination because when PVC pipe breaks down, it creates benzene which you do not want to drink. And it also reminds me of what happened in Palestine, Ohio. I think it was a year ago or so where they had the components of PVC piping spill into a waterway which caused massive deaths of the wildlife there. So that's kind of happening on a smaller scale in Los Angeles. Within the pipes that are made out of pvc, them melting and releasing benzene into the water is a horrifying situation.
23:11
Ravi Kurani
Wow, that's just, it's so it's almost like unimaginable, especially because it's so close to both me and you. And you know, like I said, my family also lives 100 miles away, 80 miles away. It is interesting to think kind of what is the implications and effects of the water quality and kind of how far does it actually go to any other points that you want to, you can.
23:40
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, just the crazy thing is that, you know, when these pipes melt, how long is it going to take to replace them? They don't really know. It could take a couple weeks or it could take months where, you know, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people are going to have contamination issues with their water. And when people don't have access to drinking water in their home, what they do is they go out and they buy bottled water. And then that creates like a, kind of like a panic with people in the community. So people don't just go buy bottled water for the day again because they don't know how long that they're not gonna be able to drink the water. So they buy as much bottled water as possible.
24:25
Reuben Vollmer
And grocery stores just can't keep up with the demand for bottled water right now. And also Note that already 1 in 5Americans is living off of bottled water, which is a statistic I just learned about a couple months ago, which is actually truly horrifying because when we have everybody going to bottled water for their source of, you know, relatively clean drinking water, we're creating a massive amount of pollution, we're hurting ecosystems around the planet because only 5% of plastic bottles get recycled. And then people are consuming an unimaginable amount of microplastics. And actually almost 40% of plastic bottled water has PFAS chemicals in it as well, which are again, known to cause birth defects, cancer, obesity, hormone disruption in children. And we don't even know really the long term effects of microplastics because they haven't been studied for that long, relatively.
25:23
Reuben Vollmer
So again, the issue is that people get a do not drink advisory or boil water advisory. They go to the store to get plastic bottled water that doesn't last very long because now you're relying on the whole system of trucks to deliver, to put on the shelves and they go right away. And again, this is like why I started Spout. So again, we have this machine that can create up to two and a half gallons of fresh drinking water a day from the air. So wherever you are, you can have your own source of water without relying on pipes or bottles.
25:55
Ravi Kurani
Yeah, I was going to say this. As heavy as this topic is, it feels like it's very much aligned with your motive of kind of why you started Spout, right? You talked about accessibility and supply of water for populations underprivileged or just even folks that have enough money to buy bottled water, but have all these negative implications of the chemicals that are in there, of creating pollution through water, water bottles. Let's kind of pivot a little bit to. I think you already opened up that door. You had mentioned this story earlier about how your parents had a farm in Los Angeles or around Los Angeles and they were kind of given a notice that, you know, they shouldn't, they don't have any more water available. You saw this dew sitting on a little piece of grass.
26:44
Ravi Kurani
And I kind of love that, I love that founding story. But let's go ahead and jump off from there. Like, why did you create Spout, maybe even within the framework of what's happening in LA today? And what are you building? Reuben?
26:56
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, so basically I started Spout because I saw that the infrastructure wasn't good enough. And whenever you have your water rights threatened or you turn on the tap and there's no water, or you get a boil water advisory, that changes you forever. I meet people all the time who have had their water threatened at some point or gotten sick from their water, and it changes how they look at water. So my goal was to create a product, a countertop product that could create water out of the air, out of the humidity in the air specifically. That's at a higher quality than anything you could get from a bottle or from a pipe. And that's made right where you need it. So again, you don't have to go to the store to get bottled water or to get water.
27:38
Reuben Vollmer
You don't have to worry about what your filters at home are catching or not catching. You can just have something that's completely reliable that can again, just like how solar panels can make electricity for your home without connecting to the grid. Now with the solar panel and spout, you can make water literally anywhere. We've tested it in a ton of different environments and it's always made water. And again, like, we worship water quality. Our mission isn't just to make water that is, you know, below the limits of all these contaminants, but to make literally the greatest water on Earth. Because I've been surprised. Again, I don't see anybody literally trying to make the greatest Water. They.
28:18
Reuben Vollmer
Everybody that I know in the industry or in bottled water tries to get just below the standard, which I get, because it's much cheaper to do that and easier. But I actually want people and the planet and plants and animals to have the greatest source of water possible. Because I think when we have a higher quality of water, we have a higher quality of life. And when we don't have to worry about where the water's coming from, whether it's a bottle or pipe, we can just live better lives with less stress.
28:50
Ravi Kurani
What is the. What does the greatest water on earth mean?
28:54
Reuben Vollmer
The greatest quality. So literally, like zero microplastics, zero PFAs, zero BPA, zero phthalates, none of any of the bad chemicals. So it's the greatest in terms of quality, the greatest in terms of price. We're a fraction of the cost of bottled water per gallon, per liter, per anything you look at. And then we're the greatest because you don't have to go to the store or be connected to a grid to get it. Like, you just have it wherever you want it.
29:23
Ravi Kurani
Really cool. And how does this spout work in order to get rid of it? Like, do you guys have, like, actually walk us through the technology? I think it's also really amazing on how you actually are able to just pull water out of thin air. How does it, how does it work?
29:38
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, so we have first a very robust air filter. It's a hospital grade air filter with an additional carbon felt on it, so we can capture volatile organic compounds, dust, smoke, viruses, bacteria, anything that might be in the air. And then we have a clay wheel that absorbs water vapor specifically from the air. That wheel rotates at 1rpm, so 3/4 of the wheels open to absorbing water vapor as it spins, and a quarter of the wheels blocked off with a separate airflow that blows hot air over the wheel to drive the moisture out of the wheel. So that hot moisture travels around into a condenser, which is able to condense the water out of it, out of that hot, moist air.
30:26
Reuben Vollmer
And that condenser is actually passively cooled by the incoming air, which is great, so we don't have to spend any extra energy cooling anything. And then that water drops down into a little tray where there's a UV light that immediately sterilizes the water. Then that water gets pumped through a water filter that has a silver impregnated carbon, activated carbon powder, activated carbon. Silver impregnated powder, activated carbon. And then it passes through an electrostatic membrane which captures gram Negative gram positive bacteria, anything that could be alive in the water, cysts or whatever, which again would be a difficult task because it just got UV sterilized. So and then in the water filter there's a remineralization chamber. So we actually add minerals back into the water. Magnesium, sodium, calcium.
31:21
Reuben Vollmer
Then that water goes through a little one way valve at the top of the filter and then it drips into our water pitcher, which actually has another UV light in it to keep the water pure. So the pitcher is about a half gallon. The pitcher fills up, the machine automatically turns off and then you can take the pitcher out or take it out whenever you want. Take the pitcher out, drink the water, enjoy it, or put the pitcher in the refrigerator if you want cold water. And yeah, that's pretty much the whole system in a nutshell. I mean, the coolest thing is that this pitcher is actually wirelessly charged. So when you put the picture in the machine, it charges through the lid a little battery that runs the UV light in the pitcher.
32:01
Reuben Vollmer
So instead of using any chemicals like chlorine to inhibit any growth, we're just using UV light to keep the water sterile over time. Because again, we want to make the greatest water, so we don't want to add anything to it. I meet a lot of people who are like, why can't we drink just water, right? Water that doesn't have any extra chemicals in it. And again, that's our mission, making the greatest water on earth and making it accessible to the most amount of people. So we have the. This is a category of technology called atmospheric water harvesters or atmospheric water generators. And basically we've developed this machine that's kind of like the apple of atmospheric water generators, where we're the smallest, we're the physically lightest, we're the quietest, and we're the most affordable.
32:47
Reuben Vollmer
So we do the most to make the water the best and to make our product mass market friendly and approachable.
32:55
Ravi Kurani
Really cool. And how much water is generated from the system.
33:00
Reuben Vollmer
So it can do up to two and a half gallons of water a day from the air.
33:03
Ravi Kurani
Two and a half gallons. Wow.
33:05
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah. And it makes at least three quarters of a gallon of water a day in the worst conditions. So like we've tested it in Joshua Tree, this high desert with at 8% humidity, it was still making about 3/4 of a gallon of water a day. That's about three liters for our European listeners and at least an up to 8 to 10 liters of water a day. So we've tested it in this high desert and we tested it in a snowstorm in Brooklyn, still making at the very least 3/4 of a gallon of water a day.
33:36
Ravi Kurani
It's amazing. And if you had mentioned earlier, it is the cheapest source of water as well. Can you just walk us through maybe a quick pricing matrix like how much is a gallon of water? If you were to use spout with, you know, your electricity bill in California or. I don't know, you can set the stage however you will. But how did you kind of get to that number of it actually being the cheapest?
34:00
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, so I would, I don't know if we're the cheapest water because, you know, like, tap water is a half a penny a gallon. Our water comes out on average at about A$27 a gallon, which is including the price of our air and water filter and the cost of electricity. So it's like the bottom line cost in average conditions. So that's A$27 a gallon for water that's way more pure than anything you can get from a bottle or from a pipe or from a municipality as far as we can tell. But again, we have no microplastics, no pfas. And that immediately eliminates, makes us better than any bottled water because I think 93% of bottled water has microplastics in it. 94% of tap water has microplastics in it. 70% of tap water in cities has PFAS chemicals in it.
34:56
Reuben Vollmer
And I think 38% of bottled water has PFAS chemicals in it. So I don't like to say that we're necessarily the cheapest water, but we are, you know, like if I had to buy a bottled water, I look at the grocery store, it's about $6 a gallon of alkaline water that is still going to come in a plastic bottle. So $6 a gallon versus a $27. Obviously it's a lot less expensive. And then a lot of people have water delivery which is even more expensive per gallon because now you're paying delivery fees and you have this emission issue too. So like environmentally, to compare spout to bottled water or even tap water, you know, obviously bottled water, you're using your first mining oil out of the ground, refining it, and then you're taking water usually from a natural ecosystem.
35:47
Reuben Vollmer
So you're kind of stealing water away from nature that way. And then you're putting it in the bottle and then you got to transport it. And water is about 8 pounds per gallon. So there's a lot of CO2 emissions that come from just moving water from the bottling plant to the grocery store. Yeah.
36:07
Ravi Kurani
Super impressive. And a kind of thought that hit me. Is there a subscription or any sort of, like, are any of these components, do you have to change them out like that? You know, copper impregnated filter or the membrane? Like, is there anything you need to do there?
36:23
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah, silver impregnated. Yeah, no worries. Yeah, so I should cover the cost, too. So basically, it's $799 is the MSRP, and then it's 49 every three months for a new air and water filter. And kind of the awesome thing about the air filter is that we've proven it removes PM 2.5 from the air. So the whole machine acts as a phenomenal air filter as well for your home.
36:49
Ravi Kurani
Wow, that's awesome. That's actually a much cheaper Dyson filter or Dyson air filter as well. That's really cool.
36:58
Reuben Vollmer
Yeah. Thank you.
37:00
Ravi Kurani
Awesome. I kind of wanted to get in the last few minutes that we had into the story of unpacking, kind of how the design and development worked. I feel like it's always really interesting for the audience to kind of get under the hood. Are there any, like, major bullet points on things that you learned while you were going through. Through the. Through the design, development, and manufacturing process?
37:25
Reuben Vollmer
Oh, man. There's so much like literally 10 years of development. So, I mean, I started off using like, a pane of glass, some tin foil, and a fan to create two overnight 10 years ago. And then I spent five years developing here at a water technology that was using essentially a refrigerator compressor, evaporator, and condenser. So, you know, I. I started my first company called Do Good Dew Good making those machines. But I. I found that there's a lot of issues with them where, you know, that works basically by creating a surface that's below the temperature of dew point. So water can condense on these surfaces and make dew. But the problem is that sometimes dew point is, you know, one degree away from ambient temperature, and sometimes it's 20 degrees or 40 degrees or sometimes it's below freezing.
38:16
Reuben Vollmer
So you literally can't make water. You can only make frost in those scenarios. So, like, that technology would work phenomenally well. Could make up to 10 gallons of water a day, or it would make, you know, five gallons or two gallons or none for days or weeks at a time. So when designing a consumer product, you know, I've done so much beta testing because I have a background in Rapid prototyping. I've made so many of these machines in so many different configurations. But what's super important to consumer is that if they're going to buy a machine that makes drinking water that they're going to rely on for their family, what's important is that it makes drinking water every day. So if it doesn't make water for a day, people are very, very upset.
38:59
Reuben Vollmer
So that's when I pivoted to this clear wheel design so that way it would work every day no matter what the conditions are. At least as far as we've tested. That's been what's happened. So, yeah, so, and again, the kind of like the biggest issue with the machine, like the most difficult part of it is controlling biological contamination, which is sort of a blessing and a curse because it means that our water is so pure that anything that touches it will grow in it. So we have to do a lot of different things inside the machine to prevent the growth of bacteria, mold, everything. And luckily, again, through rapid prototyping, making dozens and dozens of versions of the machine over the course of many years and testing it over and over again, we've made a machine that doesn't have those issues and patented it.
39:50
Reuben Vollmer
So, yeah, it's a super exciting time for the company. We also were able to hire Fred Bold, who designed the Nest thermostat, to take all of our learnings over nine years, make a new kind of case for it, make the picture for it, make it look beautiful, small, cool. And so that was a very important part of it too, because we've just been using, you know, not really investing in the industrial design of the product. And some people liked it, some people didn't like it. But, like, people have to be able to walk up to the product, know that it's going to create pure water just by looking at it, and then enjoy that water. So through working with Fred Bold, were able to make this design that people really love. And we just won this design award too.
40:38
Reuben Vollmer
That was pretty cool that were right next to Apple and Google with their products in terms of design.
40:43
Ravi Kurani
We're going to need to put all of those into the show. Notes. We're coming on close to the end of the episode and I have one final question I ask everybody. Do you have a book, a movie or a TV show that has had a profound impact or kind of changed the way that you view the world?
41:00
Reuben Vollmer
Oh, sure. I mean, the first one that comes to mind is this book Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Shoghim Trungpa Rinpoche. And I like it because it's kind of a book about spirituality, but without the spiritual part of it in a way where it kind of analyzes how people have used spirituality for enhancing their egos when they think that they're destroying their egos. And just like all the traps that are laid out through religion and spiritual practices that lead people to really growing their egos beyond control, as opposed to just like, you know, can you just sit and be. Can you just sit and breathe and be with yourself? And just using that as the baseline of reality, that's really changed my view on the world.
41:46
Reuben Vollmer
Like, learning how to meditate and just have that sense of peacefulness inside of myself and not getting caught up in the momentum of my thoughts is so important as a CEO to have that time for yourself, to just be again. I've had issues in the past where I've been a real jerk as a CEO where I've had power issues, where I want to control everything and do everything myself. And again, like, through the practice of meditation, I've really softened a lot and learned how to be more of a team player, which is just invaluable. And I think my. My team is grateful that I have these practices, and it just really humbles me. So I'm just very grateful, you know, for.
42:31
Reuben Vollmer
For that book and for my meditation practice keeping me balanced, because it can definitely get very stressful or emotional, out of balance, or again, all these momentum of our thoughts and fears. So to have that. That time every day to sit and just be is. Is invaluable.
42:46
Ravi Kurani
Awesome. We'll definitely pull that up. Ruben, thank you so much for coming on Liquid Assets. We'll go ahead and put your contact information and your LinkedIn on the show notes as well. Thanks a ton for coming on.
42:59
Reuben Vollmer
My pleasure. Thank you so much for having me, man. Good to see you.
43:02
Ravi Kurani
Yeah, good to see you, too.
43:03
Reuben Vollmer
Awesome.