Pressurized Water System for Chile

Week by week, and drop to drop, twelve students from the Art Center College of Design are working towards social change.  In partnership with Un Techo Para Mi Pais, the students develop new tools for using, storing, and transporting water to improve the quality of life of impoverished families living in campamentos/slums, Chile. Last week, we witnessed how Erica and Elizabeth created health and sanitation solutions, in order to make the families' dream of having Potable Drinking Water a reality.   This week, join Nubia, Stella and Diane and follow step by step how they find ways to create a low-cost Pressurized Water System for  the families in campamentos.

Convenience and Safety

Relying on multiple containers to complete a single task is not time or energy efficient. For people living in campamentos, Chile, a single and simple daily task may take an entire day of tiring and unsafe work.  For instance, doing laundry or washing dishes in campamentos represents going in and out of the house and carrying multiple containers of water, as opposed to the 2 hour average people in the U.S.A. spend on housework. People living in campamentos may also injure themselves having to carry heavy containers of water around the house.  They may also get sick when exposed to cold weather conditions in the process of collecting the water contained in buckets outside the house.  Unfortunately, their daily tasks are doubled by the lack of basic needs, such as having a Pressurized Water System.

Nubia, Stella and Diane, comitted their work to designing a system that harnesses gravity to afford families the ease, convenience, and dignity of turning on a tap to get running water. They focused on: How to get water delivered to a central point? How to store water within the house?  From then, they came up with onvenient low -cost product solutions:

1. Self-making gravity kit: The kit is assembled in the campamentos and used as a gravity system to move large quantities of water. It can be used by the rain collection market and the campamentos.
2. Support for manual pump:  The handy pump kit is a product meant to be used as a tool to move water. The pump is wall mounted and the hoses get plugged into the water source and where the water will be used.
3. Drill to pump water: This product is used in order to have a fast flow of water. The pump is mounted in the wall next to where large quantity of water is employed. Both ends of the pump connect, one to the water source and the other to the destination. The drill is used to turn the pump on and makes the work very efficient.

Next week, join Jesse and Narbeh and follow step by step and drop to drop how they develop a low-cost but real world potential Warm Shower for people living in campamentos, Chile. See you then!

To learn more about  Nubia, Stella and Diane's innovation for social change, watch the following presentation.

Watch the testimony of Nubia, Stella and Diane. We suggest you start asking yourself how you can also make a change in your own community.  And remember that everyone can be a changemaker!