From our Newsletter - Success at Last: Solar-Powered Water System Installed

The engineer flipped the switch and we waited anxiously as the low hum of the pump system grew louder. We wrapped our hands around the water pipe, hoping to feel the water course through it. At first nothing happened. But then it did and within seconds we felt and heard over 80 liters a minute of clean water flowing up into the two holding tanks located high above the solar panel field. For the first time in four years the villagers could believe it was happening. Penyem Village had water! Life would not be the same as before. “We have water!” shouted the group of villagers who had gathered around the village’s new functioning solar-powered water system. Tears welled in the eyes of our team members and the young boys and girls splashing in the water spilling out of the tank. The women were laughing. It was the culmination of two years of emotional hard work for our team, and a pivotal moment in the daily lives of the villagers.

As dramatic as it may seem, people in Africa have real reason to be emotional about water. Sufficient access to clean water is, according to many economists and public health experts, the number one challenge facing the developing world. Over 1 billion people (nearly 20% of the world’s population) don’t have the access to clean water that they need to thrive. Often the clean water is there–just a few meters below the surface–but developing countries lack the infrastructure to tap into it. Penyem Village, population 1,500, in The Gambia, West Africa is case in point. Penyem Village is actually ahead of many small villages in The Gambia because they received a donation 17 years ago from another non-profit organization to install a solar-powered water system. However, the pump system irreparably broke 4 years ago and the village had been without access to adequate water ever since.

Since the system went down, it has been catch-as-catch-can in the village. Most family compounds hand dug shallow wells and the village increased its reliance on a decades-old hand-pump in the center of the village. Unfortunately, shallow wells are a primary reason people get sick or die from cholera, giardia, and other water-borne illnesses. Additionally, the limited access to water prevents advancing economic prosperity. Many women and girls spend an hour or more a day just fetching water in buckets for cooking, bathing, and drinking. Further, since the water system broke in Penyem, all banana farming has disappeared and the community vegetable garden, which generated extra income for families, has turned into an empty, dry dust lot.

Thus, Friends of Penyem decided that replacing the water system was our number one priority. After two years of work, contracts with two separate engineering firms, one creative way to salvage the existing solar panels, two news pumps, a new pump control system and $15,000+ of contributions from generous donors, the village has water! The village now enjoys a system with daily pumping capacity of over 80,000 liters of water– over 50 liters per villager, which is more than enough to meet existing needs and have excess capacity for farming and other economic activities.

GAM-Solar: A Key Partner in the Search for Water

One of the great side benefits from our work on the water system is the relationship we have created with GAM-Solar, a locally-owned and operated solar-powered water system engineering firm. Hans Noteboom, the Dutch-born engineer who is GAM-Solar’s founder, and his Gambian team of engineers are a shining example of the kind of trustworthy and capable commercial enterprise that Africa badly needs. Not only did GAM-Solar successfully repair the system where others had failed, they also, with our help, negotiated a maintenance contract with the village to ensure that the water system does not go off-line again. The maintenance contract is funded by the villagers who use the water, therefore putting in place the proper incentives to conserve water and perform preventative maintenance. In addition, the contract introduces a market-based approach to water usage in the village–an important concept in a region where progress is often slowed by the perverse incentives created with shared infrastructure.

As an organization we feel that our relationships with GAM-Solar and with Gambian government officials and our growing understanding of how to accomplish projects in the developing world will be important assets as we pursue new projects.

Thank you again for your financial support in bringing water back to Penyem and we look forward to more success together in 2008!