Amortization of water cost for the Source Hydropanel

Recently, the magazine, Inc., published an article about the Source Hydropanel manufactured by Zero Mass Water. A sidebar in the article said the device produces 5 litres per day of clean water and that the cost for each panel is USD 2000. A link to the article was posted on LinkedIn. A LinkedIn member wondered what would be the "levelized" cost of water per gallon. This blog post shows one method for answering the question. The spreadsheet shows that direct capital cost is only part of the equation. But, for a quick analysis let us proceed with the bare bones information in the Inc. article.

For a 10 year equipment lifetime, cost of water (USD) is $0.41 per gallon. For 15 years it is $0.28 per gallon and for 20 years it is $0.21 per gallon.

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