During his time serving in Afghanistan, U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Steve Kwast lost 70 people in a year bringing water bottles to forward operating bases over roads with improvised explosive devices, he said.
Now retired from the military, Kwast is president at Genesis Systems, a company developing new technology to generate water from air at industrial scales.
While he is eager to partner with the U.S. Agency for International Development, Kwast is starting with a number of innovation efforts launched by the Defense Department — including some he helped to stand up — to get the technology to market.