By Alan Zagoria | Secretary EWB-RTP
We are pleased to let you know how much progress we have made. In partnership with the people of Chipozo, we are getting closer to their dream of having safe drinking water readily available year round. In our last report we described our design and the construction of two cement water tanks with a huge amount of volunteer labor from the community. Since then, 10 tapstands like the one above were installed throughout town. One is at the school.
In August, a small EWB team visited the community in support of the start of Phase 2, in which we will lay kilometers of steel and PVC pipe. We are connecting the lower tank, near the spring, to the upper distribution & storage tank; and then from the upper tank down into the community and the 10 tapstands. The chlorination system will be installed at the end of this phase.
While visiting, we were able to walk the entire pipe route to identify trail and road crossings and map the location of all 10 tapstands.
Not too surprising, we learned we had supply chain issues in acquiring the needed pipe. With great teamwork between the San Cristobal Municipality (who is paying for a good deal of the pipe) and EWB/CECEP (our partner NGO) we found a source who would supply most of the pipe we needed in a few weeks. The remaining pipe is due on site in early October. Additionally, the San Cristobal Municipality offered Chipozo their excavator for laying some of the below-ground pipe. This will be a big help in the latter parts of Phase 2.
We had a very important and successful meeting with the Chipozo Water Committee. Important topics included progress of the water system rules for individual family use and payment; initial planning for the Water Committee’s operation and maintenance of the system, and helping the Water Committee set the expectations of the community concerning what the new system will and will not do. The Water Committee will conduct a house to house survey of all the families involved to gather some more information and make sure every family has the opportunity to participate. The committee will relay the information to everyone during their all-community meetings.
Looking forward, we have issued a detailed technical and commercial Request for Proposal for the solar-powered pumping system.
Donations to the project are critical to enabling Phase 3; purchase and installation of solar panels, electrical control system and pump. Since there is no grid electricity available, this is the only way to get the fresh water from the lower tank to the upper distribution tank (distance of 1100m and elevation of 170m).
Project Objective
EWB-RTP and the indigenous Mayan village of Chipozo, Guatemala are building a system to bring clean drinking water to all of Chipozo. With accessible potable water, children can spend more time in school and families more time at work instead of seeking or carrying water and dealing with water-borne disease.
Chipozo is a remote, rugged, high region with no viable drinking water sources. Our needs assessment told us families spend about 6 hours a week retrieving drinking water. The water table is much too low to build wells. People find small springs kilometers from town, get muddy water from local sources, or use rain catchment (in season). Our project will enable the community and EWB to eliminate gastrointestinal illness and redirect human resources and school time now spent obtaining clean water.
Solution
Chipozo requested help from EWB-RTP to design (and fund) a water delivery system to bring water from a distant year-round spring to the community. There is no electrical power available in the remote area near the spring. EWB-RTP designed a system that includes a collector at the spring, a holding tank next to the spring with a pump installed inside, a photovoltaic (solar panel) system to power the pump, a pipeline from the lower tank to an upper distribution tank, and gravity-fed distribution system from the tank to 10 tapstands.
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