Humankind has only just touched the surface of salt water’s capabilities. It could provide an exciting solution to our environmental woes through its wide range of applications. Tim Duignan works on computer simulations and mathematical modelling of salt solutions. He received his PhD from the Australian National University in 2015 and has carried out postdoctoral research at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in the United States. He has received a Discovery Early Career Researcher Award to work at the University of Queensland on predicting the properties of salt solutions for energy storage applications. In his talk, Tim emphasises the vital role of salt solutions and their unpredictable properties by suggesting different tools which will facilitate the design of electrolyte solutions to realise improved performance of important applications such as energy storage and CO2 capture. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx