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Post Harvest
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Nicaragua Water Chlorinator Project Reinvigorated
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In
early 2002, the Nicaraguan government contacted CTI and asked us to
investigate the possibility of correcting the badly contaminated water
systems in the rural areas of that country. CTI responded by
engaging Americas Committee volunteers Fred Jacob (noted community
organizer with a Nicaraguan NGO) and Charles Taflin (Senior Engineer
with the Minneapolis Water Department) to design and implement a water
disinfection system. Thus, the CTI 8 water chlorinator was
created.
The chlorinator was initially installed in about 30
communities in Nicaragua under the direct supervision of Nicaraguan
Water Ministry personnel. This simple chlorinator allows the
people and communities where it is installed to have access to
disinfected drinking water for pennies per day. Unfortunately,
due to political issues in Nicaragua, the dissolution of the Nicaraguan
Water Ministry, and challenges securing appropriate chlorine tablets,
the project has been less active than desirable the last few years.
 However, in recent months, the
National Health Ministry has been given jurisdiction over rural water and has
been in communication with CTI to reinstate the water chlorinator program.
That, along with a recent breakthrough in obtaining the proper
chlorine tablets, prompted
Fred Jacob to visit Nicaragua last month where he
checked on the
chlorinators that had been installed by CTI a few years ago. What he found was
encouraging! Fred reports, "It was
heartwarming to see that most of the chlorinators and water systems were in
acceptable to wonderful condition!"
CTI is actively forging
ahead with this project and is working towards the goal of making 50 chlorinators
fully operational within 90 days!
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"CTI in Haiti" Video is Online!
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 We're excited to announce that a new video covering CTI's partnership with Meds and Food for Kids in Haiti is online!
Spare six minutes for this one; you won't regret it. (Click image to view video or go to www.youtube.com/CompatibleTechnology.) |
CTI Receives Recognition from Buckminster Fuller Institute
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CTI was invited to attend an award ceremony in Chicago to recognize the
winner of the Buckminster Fuller Challenge grant (MIT) as well as the
33 finalists, which included CTI.
Roger, CTI Executive Director, attended the event on CTI's behalf and summarized CTI's submission, "CTI had submitted a project from the Asia Committee which
addressed developing a water harvesting model to provide both a reliable supply
of water for crop irrigation and for resale as drinking water to
surrounding communities in Tamil Nadu, India. This project, which was initiated by Ram
Krishnan, the Chair elect of the CTI Asia Committee, has scope for replication
in other countries of Asia and Africa; the
project showed a payback on the initial investment ($100,000) in technology in two
years. The project anticipates locating
solar powered pumps capable of pumping harvested water into storage tanks for
subsequent chlorination and distribution through drip feed irrigation systems."
The BFI Challenge attracted 6,000 entries from 25 countries and some 50
universities worldwide, including MIT, Stanford and CalTech, many of
which had
representatives at the ceremony. It was
apparent that this is considered a prestigious and competitive
technological award within the academic community, and it is a
testament to CTI's technologies that we were listed amongst the top six
entries in the judgment of the jurors.
Congratulations to Ram Krishnan, to Anne-Marie Hendrickson who crafted our submission,
and to the Asia Committee (Steve and Nancy Laible).
 
(Empty
pond)
(Filled with rainwater)
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Why CTI: Kathy Junek
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We'd like to start a new
tradition by taking the opportunity every Post
Harvest to introduce you to someone who has chosen to be a part of CTI,
whether they are a volunteer, board member, donor, or member of a partner
organization, and to let them tell you in their own words why they have chosen
to do so. We hope you will enjoy hearing
these fresh voices tell you about CTI.
For our inaugural introduction, we'd like to introduce you to Kathy Junek, the Chair of our board.
For my "day job," I currently volunteer with the Anoka County
Public Defenders helping defend indigent people charged with crimes. I have
been involved with CTI for about eight years, I think. I will finish six years
on the board this December and spent a few years before that helping with CTI's
newsletter and annual reports.
 I first heard about CTI through a presentation given at my
church by long-time volunteer Malcolm McLean,
but the reason I'm still excited about and involved with CTI is because I see
things really beginning to move. [Executive Director] Roger has brought a
delightful energy and enthusiasm coupled with a thoughtful pragmatism that I
believe will move the organization into a position of helping many more of the
world's poorest. One of the most exciting things I see happening at CTI is
that our technology group has expanded to produce new technologies and position
us to help people in additional geographic locales.
Whether one's perspective is from a religious, social
justice, or national security point of view, helping the world's poorest out of
life-threatening poverty is a critical task that all of us should join. We
simply cannot go on believing that the world's poor are not relevant to us. CTI
is making a real difference, and can make much more difference, if we have more
assets of every sort. | |
CTI Receives Delegation from Uganda
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Thanks to
Africa Committee member Kizito Kalema, a group of Ugandan
members of Parliament and American-Ugandan business people visited CTI to learn
about our technologies and our interest in activities in the Busoga Region of Uganda.
The group, headed by the Deputy Speaker of the Parliament, saw reason to be
encouraged that CTI's technologies could be put to good use in their country.
CTI also
made the only presentation by a non-Ugandan group at their annual conference.
Our presentation focused on our water disinfection device and on our emerging
technologies. Attendance was approximately 50 people and included several
politicians.
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University of St.
Thomas Seniors Complete Breadfruit Project
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After a full year's
work, the five students involved in this project presented their findings to
their peers and professors at the Annual St. Thomas University Engineering Design
Fair. The students, Aaron Brooks, Cody Benoy, Rachael Willenbring, Jake Thomas and
Tony Caruso focused on designing, building, testing and implementing an
efficient, robust and cost-effective breadfruit processing system that is
versatile enough to be used in diverse locations and environments throughout
the world. The process that they developed incorporated modifications to Dave
Elton's shredder and the Ewing grinders as
part of this total process.
Well done engineers!
For more background on this project, see the article in our March 2009 issue.
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