Hasta La Ideas

The most talented creative minds can draw connections between seemingly unrelated things—like diapers and a field of crops–in order to produce new solutions. That’s how Mexican chemical engineer Sergio Jesus Vaelasco created Solid Rain, a highly absorbent polymer scientifically known as potassium polyacrylate. Originally intended to make diapers more absorbent, Vaelasco’s blend can soak up water to about 500 times its size, and it looks like large salt crystals:

For landscape architects and environments designers it could mean more creative options for plants in drought-heavy areas. Solid Rain could ensure that green landscapes exist and thrive even in water-scarce urban areas, and other places where greenery has a tougher time surviving and so is conspicuously missing.

And the stuff is fairly inexpensive: For $25 you can buy a pound of it, which can go a long way—10 grams of the crystals can absorb up to a liter of water.

When full of water the crystals form a translucent gel blob that can then provide moisture to plants for up to one year, depending on the size and amount of Solid Rain used. The water never evaporates or runs off—it is only absorbed by the roots of plants. And the plants don’t absorb the polymer because it is, oddly enough, insoluble in water.

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