Engineers Without Borders - USA

Globing Giving Honduras Update March 2011

A team of six volunteers traveled to El Negrito, Honduras and completed the initial assessment and field work in September 2010.
Subsequently the Field Assessment Report was completed and submitted to Engineers Without Borders (EWB) in November 2010.

A project status teleconference meeting was held between EWB –USA and EWB-SCFL.
The discussion centered on the procedure adopted by EWB SCFL, that is, EWB-SCFL would prepare a master plan of the project, followed by a detailed design prepared by SANAA (local Honduran water entity) of El Negrito. EWB-SCFL would then review the design before implementation.
EWB-USA had an issue with this approach and suggested that EWB-SCFL take responsible charge of the entire project or any section of it.

Since then, EWB-SCFL has been communicating with the Mayor from El Negrito, Javier Umana of the Municipality and the local Peace Corps representative in El Negrito. EWB-SCFL has been trying to determine if the current scope of the project remains as it was outlined in the field assessment report. EWB-SCFL determined that there had been some variations though not significant enough to officially revise the field assessment report.

EWB-SCF evaluated three areas of the project and is currently prioritizing the one to take full responsible charge. EWB-SCF plans to design approximately 3 Km for a new raw water transmission pipeline parallel to the existing pipeline currently servicing El Negrito. In any event, there will be a need for a detailed route and topographic survey of the project’s route.
EWB-SCF is in constant conversations with El Negrito regarding these matters. In the meantime, EWB-SCF is finalizing the field survey specifications to guide the topographic survey activities in El Negrito.

The team is continuing planning for Phase 2 sanitation improvements.  We are researching several types of latrines including pit, pour flush, septic and composting.  Pour flush is the most probable option as a couple of families have pour flush latrines already installed.

Our estimated travel date of the Phase 2 assessment is June 2011.  We will be collecting data for the latrine implementation.  We will also be conducting a follow-up health assessment and expect to have conclusive evidence of the positive effects of the new well and distribution system installed earlier this year.

The team is meeting to begin our Phase 2 project planning.  Now that the community has clean drinking water, we are going to focus on sanitation.  We are researching various types of latrines with pour flush the most probable option as a couple of families have pour flush latrines already installed.

Our estimated travel date of the Phase 2 assessment is February/March 2011.  We will be collecting data for the latrine implementation.  We will also be conducting a follow-up health assessment and expect to have conclusive evidence of the positive effects of the new well and distribution system installed earlier this year.