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Construction continues to progress well. Nearly all of the bricks are laid for the tank walls and they have begun to build the foundations for the chemical tables. The policarbonate polycarbonate panels for the floc and sed modules arrived Thursday 12.11. Other miscelaneaous miscellaneous materials should arrive later this week so that all is ready to begin assembling the modules when the students are here in January.

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Tamara

As of Thursday 12.11, pproximately aproximately 150 gpm were arriving to the plant from La Chorrera. Earlier in the week the Junta had fixed a broken pipe in the conduction line. With the Manzanal and La Chorrera, so much flowrate is arriving that the new pressure-break box that the Junta built is overflowing because there is not enough capacity in the pipe from the box to the plant to carry all of the water. However, 180 gpm are arriving to the plant, which is nearly full capacity and should be plenty to supply the community. The Junta will need shut off the Manzanal or devise a way to reduce flow from La Chorrera to prevent the pressure-break box from overflowing, since this overflow will cause erosion.

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Friday 12.12 Antonio went to Tamara to help Carlos and Karin clean the plant. The emptied and cleaned all floc and sed tanks. When reinstalling the floc modules, they glued the spacers together so that they will not fall appart when removed. They also installed a 2" bronze globe valve on the exit tank where the operator fills the bucket for filling the chemical barrels. The handle on the old 2" PVC globe valve had become brittle and broken, likely due to exposure to sun or chlorine. In future plants we need to remember that these large PVC globe valves are not sufficiently durable.

Marcala

Tamar travelled traveled to Marcala Monday 12.08 and Tuesday 12.09 to check up on plant performance there. I worked with Oscar, the plant operator who has been working at the plant longest. In Marcala they use a valve to administer the chlorine, different than the other AguaClara plants that use a CCC. Since the level in the chlorine stock tank changes significantly, (the tank holds 1,100L) the chlorine dose changes as well. On the data sheets Oscar is only recording yes/no if he is applying chlorine. ADEC is monitoring the chlorine levels, and they vary from 0.1mg/L to 2.5mg/L, which is expected when there is no instrument to ensure constant flow of chlorine. Additionally, the chlorine flows through 3 elbows which are not stable and also contribute to varying levels of chlorine being applied.
Another problem in Marcala is that sometimes the Municipality is late with buying chlorine, and ADEC claims they are buying very old chlorine stock at a discounted price. Nonetheless, the plant is performing well with turbidity results. The turbidity was entering the plant at 12NTU and leaving at under 2NTU while I was there.
In January we hope to define a better working relationship with ADEC, APP and Cornell. We currently feel that although Fred constantly extends the invitation to work at Marcala, we would like to be clear with ADEC that we are available for capacitation help with the operators, and if we will be working at the plant in an educational context to explain that as well.

Flow Control Modules

As suggested by Scott, Antonio rotated the float 180 degrees in the Ojojona and Tamara flow control modules. We will monitor these modules over the next weeks to see whether they clog less than they did previously.

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We mentioned IAF (Inter-American Fountation) to Jacobo and Arturo, but they said it would not be a viable funding source for AguaClara. First, APP has already recieved received millions of dollars in funding from IAF and they said that they won't be able to receive any more in the near future. Second, they said that IAF normally does not provide much funding for water infrastructure projects like AguaClara. Normally they are looking for grass-roots initiatives.

Jacobo thinks tha SETCO, a Honduran governmental organization that uses international donations to fund infrastructure projects, could be a very good funding source for AguaClara. They only provide funds for materials, but that would still be a significant help. They could provide similar support to what Alianza para el Agua is providing for the 4 Communities plant. In some cases, the municipality would likely be able to find the rest of the funding. We plan to make proposals to SETCO for plants in Agalteca and Guaimaca. Gracias, Lempira could also be a good project for SETCO, once we have reliable turbidity data from there and know how the treatment plant will fit into other improvements they plan to make to the water system.

We hope to schedule a meeting in January with Monroe and a small group of people from different NGO's to have a discussion about how to move further and branch into other organizations resources and funding sources.