Atop the roof of his father's New Castle Candy business, Tom Joseph has installed three swooping domes that use the sun to clean and purify water. Later this year, the young entrepreneur hopes to begin installing the technology in other unconventional places: Haiti, India, Iraq.

Mr. Joseph is the founder of Epiphany Solar Water Systems, a 2-year-old company that's combining the ambition and business plan of a tech startup with the mission of a nonprofit: to bring clean water to developing countries.

More than 2.5 billion people worldwide lack access to safe and clean water, according to UNICEF, and the prevalence of waterborne diseases can turn a case of diarrhea into a death sentence in some countries. Mr. Joseph is taking his technology to regions where there is little water but a lot of sun.

The Epiphany system uses solar power, not fuel, to purify water. It's a system he envisions selling to municipalities, military bases, even large apartment buildings. But his first venture will focus on places like the small villages he toured as part of market research.

"This system could work for one house in the U.S. -- or an entire village in India," he said.

Epiphany technology staggers three domes on top of a 20-foot-long storage container that holds the water purification tanks. As the domes turn toward the sunlight, the solar power they collect is used to heat oil in one of the tanks. The oil runs through a coil that snakes through the water, which can come from local streams or wells.

As the oil heats, the coil gets very hot and causes the water to vaporize. The steam is then recondensed back to liquid form. The process filters out metallic contaminants or even salt from ocean water.

Mr. Joseph wants the construction to be "simpler than Ikea furniture."

After all, most Epiphany clients probably won't be able to call a customer service line.

"The parts they use are off the shelf," said William "Gus" Pagonis, who was director of logistics for the U.S. Army during the Gulf War and is now a member of Epiphany's board of directors.

The water purification industry has grown as the natural resource has become a new focus for charities and organizations such as the United Nations. Bottled water companies have tried expanding into the market, and other firms are pursuing the transfer of Alaskan lake water to countries in the Middle East. Others are focusing on more large-scale solutions, like S2C Global, a San Antonio-based water purification company that is building a purification plant in India.

The Epiphany system is one of the first to purify water without using fuel. That's an especially timely asset since an uprising in Libya has caused gasoline prices to swell again, said Mr. Pagonis.

The Epiphany process adds up to a steady trickle of water that accumulates into 500 gallons of "pharmaceutical-grade" water per day, said Mr. Joseph. He and his four co-workers drink it themselves in the second-floor office space above New Castle Candy.

Mr. Joseph traded sunny California for New Castle in 2005 when he moved back to help turn around his father's candy business.

But a plan to stay for only 18 months was curtailed when the family went into business with another New Castle resident and began selling horse snacks under the Uncle Jimmy's brand, a line of chew treats that alleviate "stall boredom," have names like Uncle Jimmy's Hangin' Balls and will gross $1.5 million in revenue this year. What's a candy company doing in the barn? The horse treats are made of grain held together by lollipop syrup.

But horse treats weren't enough for Mr. Joseph, who earned his engineering degree in Florida and worked on several solar-related projects there, including a solar-powered shrimp farm.

He learned about the worldwide water shortage from a documentary and woke the next morning with his solar-powered idea -- a revelation that was something of an epiphany, though Mr. Joseph has always wanted to name a company that.

Epiphany has supported itself so far on funding from Innovation Works, the nonprofit startup incubation program near the Birmingham Bridge.

But to start expanding the technology beyond New Castle, Mr. Joseph is pitching local angel investors and estimates he'll need about $1 million in funding. He wants to quadruple his work force to 20 employees in the next year.

He's gotten pushback from investors weary of business plans that focus solely on international clients. But Mr. Joseph said he was not going to cater to private residences when the same technology could be of better use to developing countries.

That mentality is part of Epiphany's delicate balance between for-profit startup and nonprofit ideals. To handle work with foundations and charities, Mr. Joseph started Project Eviive, a nonprofit within the company.

The company has plans to install an Epiphany system at the Albert Schweitzer Hospital in Haiti, a health care facility managed by a Point Breeze nonprofit. Each Epiphany system costs around $25,000, or -- if the system's life span is estimated at 20 years -- about one penny per gallon.

Until he can start getting to work in the places that need it most, Mr. Joseph and his father will just keep answering questions about what those big domes are up on the roof.

"I tell people I'm tracking aliens with them," he said, "with a real straight face."