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In a context of climate change and increasing need of fresh water in the world, rain and dew water can have a significant impact as new sources of water, especially in arid and semi-arid areas. The aim of the paper is to demonstrate that atmospheric moisture can be harvested and processed into safe drinking water comparable in quality and price to reverse osmosis processed water available in the market. The paper describes the construction and functioning of a water production plant in northwest India (Kothara). Rain and dew are collected; for dew special attention has to be taken. In particular, special condenser architecture (ridges) is designed using Computational Fluid Dynamics simulation and improved condensing surfaces are operated. Dew yields are estimated from the meteo data and using simulation. From the figures an economic model is derived; it comes out that water passively harvested from atmospheric moisture may be cheaper than that from reverse osmosis and does not pollute the environment, supporting the importance of dew and rain resources to provide supplementary supply of potable water in arid and semi-arid environment. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.