Agua SALud Project
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The objective of the Agua SALud project is to assess the potentials of solar desalination
in remote communities of the Baja California
Peninsula, Mexico.
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Report of summer 2004 fieldwork in
Mexico
An
interdisciplinary team formed by seven Berkeley students traveled to the
Peninsula of Baja California during the summer of 2004 with the goal of
documenting water access and quality in remote communities. The project was
coined Agua SALud, in allusion to the intrinsic relation between water quality
and people’s health, as well as the high levels of salinity found in the
peninsula’s water sources (Agua = water, Salud = health, SAL = salt).
Preparation Work in Berkeley
The
Agua SALud project emerged in the fall of 2003 with the interest of analyzing
the feasibility of introducing solar desalination units into communities that
only have access to high salinity water sources. The project members initiated
a programme to design, construct and test such units at UC Berkeley’s Renewable
and Appropriate Energy Lab (RAEL). The initiative included comparing the
performance of construction materials, the efficiencies of different designs
and analyzing the system’s ability to remove other contaminants.
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Construction
process of a solar desalination unit. The structure of the unit is made out
of cardboard and then covered with multiple layers of fiberglass |
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In parallel, the students began a dialogue with two institutions in the state of Baja California Sur, Mexico: the National Council for the Promotion of Education (CONAFE), and the National Water Commission (CNA). The purpose of forging these relationships was to gather information about water availability across the Peninsula, in order to design the best plan for the implementation of the solar desalination units.
With the help of CONAFE, a federal decentralized institution in charge of providing elementary education in remote and migrant communities, the students received qualitative data of water quality in the region in the spring of 2004. For many years CONAFE instructors have been reporting lack of water access as the main problem present in the rural communities, and they particularly emphasize the high salinity levels found in several water sources.
In
hopes of acquiring quantitative data, the students approached CNA which
licenses and monitors the use of groundwater wells. However, due to limited
funds, CNA focuses only on wells extracting high volumes of water either for
large irrigation projects or urban distribution systems, leaving hundreds of
wells used by remote communities out of their scope. This meant that there was
no qualitative information in the water use practices and water quality issues
of remote communities.
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Fermin testing different desalination units in
Berkeley, CA |
Without
having solid data to work with, the project team had to change its strategy. The
team members decided to first spend a summer documenting water quality and
access, and then use the collected data to design a more appropriate scheme for
the introduction of solar desalination units.
Water
from high salinity sources, apart from being unpalatable for consumption, can
have negative impacts on the health of humans. It is suspected that the
consumption of high salinity water can increase the risk of developing
hypertension and stone disease. Since the population in the world exposed to high
salinity water is scattered in small communities, there have been only few and
non-conclusive studies on this matter.
With
the motivation to further investigate this puzzle, the Agua SALud team decided to
perform a cross-sectional epidemiological study of the possible health
consequences of drinking high salinity water as part of the summer field
studies. In May 2004, the team received the 7th Student Project
Award from the Berkeley’s Center for Occupational and Environmental Health
(COEH) in support for carrying out the epidemiological study.
With
support from Engineers for a Sustainable World - Berkeley (ESW-B), the College
of Engineering, RAEL, COEH, the Woodside Rotary Club, Berkeley Professors and Alumni;
the Agua SALud team took off to do fieldwork in Baja California Sur the last
week of May 2004.
Fieldwork in Mexico
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Florence collecting water samples from well in Boca del Alamo |
During
the last week of May, the Agua SALud team established a base in La Paz, the
capital city of the Baja California Sur state, where the Reygadas and Shroyer
families kindly hosted the students in their homes for the rest of the summer.
The first two weeks in Mexico were spent designing the fieldwork logistics and
polishing survey and water analysis techniques with staff from the partner
organizations.
At CNA the team found a first-class but
abandoned Flame Photometer ideal for the important sodium concentration
measurements. Some pieces of the Flame Photometer were missing and the CNA
staff did not know how to operate it anymore. Combining the Berkeley
engineering skills and the creativity needed in environments with few
resources, the Agua SALud team fixed the apparatus, developed a protocol for
use, and trained the CNA staff to operate the Flame Photometer.
In
the second week of June, the Agua SALud team, accompanied by a representative
from CONAFE, hit the road to initiate what would be 9 weeks of difficult
fieldwork filled with amazing experiences. During this period the team visited
more than 20 communities along Baja California Sur; including fishing camps in
the shores of the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific Ocean, ranches settled deep in
the Sierras, and agricultural camps harvested by migrant workers from mainland
Mexico.
A
typical day of work in the communities started with a visit to the CONAFE
representative to explain the reason and general procedure of the
investigation. During this interaction, which was always accompanied with a
kindly offered home-ground cup of coffee, the team gathered information about
the whereabouts of the households and proximity of water sources in the
community. Then, the team usually split in two groups: one was responsible for
surveying the community members, and the other was in charge of collecting
samples from all water sources and storage tanks.
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Eva, Nerea and Fermin interviewing a family in San Miguel |
The
first group of students used three different questionnaires to gather
information from the community members. One focused on collecting information
about the local resources found in the community, including the construction
materials that were easily accessible, and the expertise people had in working
with wood, masonry, metals and fiberglass. This was done with the intention of
assessing the viability of promoting locally developed water purification
systems in the future. A second questionnaire targeted mothers with children
under five, and looked at the incidence of diarrhea versus water access and
sanitary practices. The third questionnaire was the core of the epidemiological
study, it targeted adults in the community and it was composed of a physical examination
and a set of questions related to the water consumption of the individual and
their medical history.
The
second group of students looked at the water quality issues. Due to the
geographic conditions of the peninsula, the water sources were always of
groundwater origin. Most communities relied on artisan wells and springs, some
on motorized wells connected to simple distribution systems and others on water
brought by the Military Disaster Relief Unit in big tanker-trucks. Independent
of the source, people stored their water in plastic barrels, ranging from 50 to
200 liters of capacity.
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Aren and Summer performing microbial
tests in Palma Sola, San Jose Island |
The
water quality group recorded the location and characteristics of each of these
sources. They measured the temperature,
pH, conductivity and total dissolved solids in the water, and collected samples
for further analysis. While still in the community and usually in the evenings,
the team performed arsenic, nitrate and microbial contamination tests on the
samples collected during the day. The nitrate and arsenic tests were done using
field test kits which did not require much time to run; however, the bacteria
colonies in the microbial tests needed to be grown at 35ºC for a 24hr period.
The most difficult part of this task was keeping the electric incubator running
in the field where it was really hard to find a place to plug it in to an
electric connection or to recharge its battery. Often times the team had to
bring the bacteria plates into their sleeping bags to ensure they had a warm
and “healthy” growing night!
From
each fieldtrip the team brought back samples from the water sources to be
further analyzed for sodium concentration at the CNA lab using the newly fixed
Flame Photometer. To validate the field test kit measurements, samples were
also brought to the U.S. and sent to a laboratory at the University of
Washington for arsenic concentration.
Results
At
the end of three months of fieldwork, the Agua SALud team had visited 24
communities, interviewed 350 of its members and traveled more than 10,000
kilometers by pick-up, bus, boat, and mule.
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Large-scale abandoned solar desalination plant, El
Pardito Islet |
The results of the water quality tests were
disheartening; however, based on the survey results there is reason to hope that
the situation can be improved. The detailed study confirmed the lack of access
to potable water initially reported by CONAFE instructors. More than half of
the people living in these rural communities consume water with fecal
contamination. Around one third of the water sources tested showed
concentrations of arsenic and sodium higher than the levels allowed by the
Mexican Government (which are similar to those established by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency). A handful of water sources had high levels of
nitrate; most of these sources where located near agricultural camps or areas
with cattle and goat herding. On the up side, the community members, especially
those with children, showed great interest in modifying their sanitary and
water fetching/storage practices in order to improve their health conditions.
Most of the water sources in the communities
are not properly adapted or maintained to prevent contamination, and in fact
the Agua SALud team often detected high levels of bacteria present right at the
source. Surprisingly, in several cases where the source was clean, the team
observed that water got contaminated with fecal matter both in the water
fetching and storage processes, even when the community members were following
the Health Ministry recommendations of always covering the storage tanks and
washing them every week with soap.
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Eva and Fermin discussing water
quality and health issues with a family in La Ceiba agricultural camp |
Further investigation and an ad hoc experiment
revealed that the microbes were getting into the water when people immersed
cups or glasses into the containers to draw water for drinking purposes. In
this process, people dipped the cup and usually part of their hand too, neither
of which were necessarily clean. Fortunately the solution for this issue is
quite simple: the Health Ministry and other organizations have to strongly
encourage people to store water in containers that have a tap or a manual pump
(which can be done with less than $1 U.S. dollar) in order to reduce contact
and therefore contamination.
Water is essential in Baja California Sur and people are very
receptive to projects like the one organized by the Berkeley team. Throughout the
summer, everywhere on the peninsula the Agua SALud team received positive
participation from community members and staff of governmental and
non-governmental organizations. The team was often invited, and almost forced
to make commitments to go back to the communities not only to help in water
issues, but also to share another cup of coffee and a homemade quesadilla while
telling jokes under the precious shade of a palapa (palm-woven roof).
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Agua SALud Team
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Agua SALud team heading to Santa
Cruz, a beautiful community in the canyons of the Sierra de la Giganta |
Fermin Reygadas
MS/PhD Student
Energy and Resources Group
Aren Hansen,
MS Chemistry
MS Student
Environmental Engineering
Eva Tovar,
MD
MPH Student
School of Public Health
Eva Markiewicz
Undergraduate Student
College of Engineering
Summer Nastich, LLM
PhD Student
Environmental Engineering
Florence Cassassuce
MS Student
Geoenvironmental Engineering
Rebecca Leonardson
PhD Student
Environmental Engineering
Claudia Espino
Undergraduate Student
Environmental Engineering
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Appendices
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Descriptions
of Partner Organizations
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Agua SALud in the news!
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Engineering
News, April 19, 2004
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The 2004 Environmental
Engineering Alumni News Letter
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Support for this
project has been provided by:
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The Center for Occupational and Environmental Health
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The College of Engineering
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The Energy Foundation
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Engineers for a Sustainable World - Berkeley
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Berkeley Alumni and Professors
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The Woodside Rotary Club
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Individual donors