Somewhere in the middle of Ontario is a company hidden from view. Sitting on 5 acres of reforested farmland is Blue Planet Environmental. I guess you can call them innovative scientists, who are using patented aeration technology and what they call “nano-bubbles” or really, really small bubbles of air, to make big changes in industries connected to water.
The core of Blue Planet’s technology is a nano-bubbler. It can inject various gases (such as oxygen, ozone or carbon dioxide) into nano-sized bubbles (human hair is about 80,000 nanometers wide) for use in hydroponics systems, golf course and residential ponds, fish and shrimp farms, showerheads for a cleaner scrub down and exfoliation, above ground pools, and washing machines to remove soap residue from clothes.
Add a bubbler to a septic system to reduce maintenance and the size of the dispersal bed, and consumers can save money and be supportive of the environment around them.
David Burns, a design engineer in socks, showed us that their technology can even make a mean chocolate milkshake –– producing an uncountable number of chocolate bubbles that increase the taste of his favourite drink. (That invention is currently just used in house – and is pictured above).
And when they say in-house they mean literally in their house. The offices of Blue Planet are in a large two-story century home surrounded by woods; the house is complete with an indoor pool for testing new devices and prototypes.
In the lower back of the house is a greenhouse where basil, cherry tomatoes, yellow cucumbers, and some of the hottest peppers on earth, using nano-bubblers, are being grown. I think Dave (in our pictures) called the peppers Scorpions.
Blue Planet founder Richard Lonetto saw the potential in bubbles, and with Blue Planet’s engineers have been patenting and creating systems based on their core technology over the last 8 years.
Blue Planet clearly encourages creativity and inventions that can have a wide variety of uses on a global level. In New York City his company supports Blue Planet Consulting where Henry Gordon-Smith (see him below) advises schools, real estate owners and private people on how to set up hydroponic and urban farms.
The company also takes on custom turnkey builds; for example Sweet Unity, a fair trade coffee company that grows coffee in Tanzania had a complete system design and shipped by Blue Planet. The farm is owned by David Robinson, the son of baseball legend Jackie Robinson.
It all goes back to bubbles.
The Blue Planet group is also keen to talk about their BioBoost water remediation and maintenance solutions which are installed in a number of PGA golf courses in the United States. BioBoost uses a natural system to insure that ponds do not become stagnant while encouraging beneficial bacteria to grow and thrive in the ponds. Blue Planet estimates there are a hundreds of thousands of such ponds in the United States alone. The BioBoost system is submerged in a pond for maximum effect. The standard BioBoost system is about the size of a large aquarium, and maximizes the dispersion of bubbles throughout the pond on a continual basis.
Being at Blue Planet makes one want to linger longer too. We look into the fish tank and see nano-bubbles quietly keeping the fish tank crystal clear –– nano bubbles are everywhere.
When asked, Dave admits that Richard does sing about tiny bubbles frequently. And yes, the Don Ho song has come up:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlCiDEXuxxA[/youtube]
So if you haven’t been sold on Richard’s bubbles yet, why not give them a taste? His company is producing drinking water by combining spring water on the property with their technology. If that’s what it takes to be as creative as the people at Blue Planet –– then sign me up for a few bottles. Made from recycled materials, we hope.
