Honduras Interns Progress Report
Date: 2/7/08
Location: Tamara
Work Plan: Since we have a several different types of work going on at once we decided to divide up the tasks between us so all three of us are not working on everything. Antonio will be in charge of coordinating capacitation workshops in Tamara with support from John and Carol. Other tasks were divided between John and Carol. Antonio will be somewhat involved with everything since we are learning from him and he is learning from us. While we will all be keeping tabs on all parts of the project, this puts one person in charge of the details of each part.
Tamara Construction - John
¿ WORK COMPLETED THIS WEEK
o Construction Update: The tank floors are poured and drains are in place. Work has begun on the tank walls. Currently there are 5 levels of brick in, up to the first "solera" (poured beam) that is 1/3 of the way up the wall.
o Worked with Ing. Serrano to make final revisions of the plans. He was supposed to make all changes Friday, Feb 8 and have the plans printed by Monday. Once they are finalized we'll send a copy to Cornell.
¿ We're thinking that the chlorine tables should be the same level as the sulfate tables. As you mentioned, this would be necessary for pre-chlorination, and there is no significant advantage to making them shorter (only that they're easier to step up onto).
o Revised the parts list (tubes, accessories, tools, laminas and other misc. things).
o Designed PVC platform to support lamina.
o Finally reviewed plant levels Mathcad Program and had a few questions and comments. (Sent to Monroe and Raul in separate e-mail)
¿ FUTURE PLANS
o Design details - walls and table for laminas in particular
o Schedule of construction
o Look over and revise the manual written at Cornell last year for the lamina modules
o Hand in pipe and accessories list to APP so they can start buying
o Buy enough materials to make one trial sed tank module and build it as a trial run, to see how many spacers we need and how many lamina work well per module.
o Design of distribution of flow from plant to three tanks
o Support with Yovani (Tamara fontanero) about chlorine and collecting data
o Help the Junta with a maintence plan for the sources
o Visit plant site and take pictures to send to Cornell University
o Follow up with linea de base for Tamara with Canales
Ojojona - Carol
o Work Completed
o All three of us went to Ojojona Tuesday, Feb 5.
¿ Carol showed Julia how to enter the data the Fontaneros take into Excel and send it by e-mail to Cornell and APP. Julia sent the most recent week of data and will continue to do so week by week.
¿ We built a clear sludge sampling tube and tried it out.
¿ The tube a 2m ½" PVC tube with 1m of ¾" clear plastic hose attached to the bottom. Another ½" PVC tube runs the length of the apparatus to keep the hose stiff.
¿ We inserted the probe at an angle through the lamellae near the center of the tank. Apparently the ¾" hose is too large to keep air from entering the bottom and water from coming out. We are able to extract the sludge with the tube, but once the tip of the probe leaved the tank, air enters through the end and the sludge falls out. Our solution to this problem is to always leave the tip underwater until the sludge level is measured. If we want to pull out the tube completely, the operator must plug the end with his finger.
¿ It is best to let the sample tube sit submerged in the bottom of the tank for a full minute before extracting it. This allows the sludge levels inside and outside the tube to equalize and provides for a better sample.
¿ We measured of sludge level of between 50 to 70 cm in the sample tube, depending on the tank. Taking into account the 60 deg angle, this is a level of 43 to 61 cm.
¿ The operators had not emptied the sed tanks for a month, since Chris Bordlemeyer visited, and have been getting good results (effluent turbidity consistently below 2 NTU with influent of 5 to 6 NTU). This suggests the sludge blanket is working.
¿ Purges tank 2, which has the sludge manifold installed, for 2 minutes. We decided that opening the valve one full turn is the right purge rate, enough to let the sludge out, but not enough to disturb the sed tank. Sludge came out for the full 2 minutes.
¿ We printed new data sheets for the operators based on Chris Bordlemeyer's suggestions and trained them how to use the sheets. These data sheets include spaces for chemical barrel levels, sludge levels, sludge purge records and the distribution tank levels.
o Future Plans
o Support with the water tariff
¿ We have a scheduled meeting with the Alcalde for Friday 15th of February. It was a written request for a meeting so Martin believes he should show up. We are hoping that after this they will raise the tariff.
o Presentations and certifications of the operators
¿ We hope to make a certification with the signature of Jacobo and the Alcalde making the training more official. The fontaneros are still expressing concerns that they might be replaced.
o Help with collection of data
¿ Follow up on the new changes that we have made at the plant in Ojojona and help Julia to enter and send the data.
o Ask about sulfate (running low)
¿ There appears to be only one bag of sulfate at the plant and in the past week or so they have been applying sulfate. Antonio introduced them to the APP supplier.
o Looks for information on health data
¿ Try to contact the Centro de Salud and find more specific data.
o Help with anything that may come up
¿ See if they can post something about the water in the Junta, publicity campaign
New Communities - Carol
o COMPLETED THIS WEEK
o Ciudad Espana
¿ Presented to Ciudad Espana over the plant. They seemed very interested and attentive as always.
¿ Friday February 8th we left a turbidimeter and tables for them to fill out.
o On February 7th Antonio and I (Carol) visited communities close to Zanmorano. We had planned to visit Moroceli, Villa de San Francisco y San Antonio de Oriente. However after stopping by Zanmorano to speak with Erika Tenorio we found that San Antonio had less than 100 houses and Moroceli continued much the same.
o We were given other options which were Winnopei, la libertad de comayaguela, Cantarranes, San Juancito y Valle de Angeles.
o In the end we visited Villa de San Francisco, Catarranes, and San Juancito. We also visited San Buena Ventura on another day.
o Most of the communities we have visited have different problems, below is a brief description of those problems
¿ Villa de San Francisco
¿ Has 3 water systems, 1 has a population of 1,000 houses but is handled by the municipality. The other two systems have around 200 houses
¿ Catarranes
¿ Also handled by the municipality, looking into adding another source because the current one isn't suffient and they don't know if they are going to converge in one location.
¿ San Juancito
¿ Each Barrio (around 6) has their own water system. The largest is only about 200 houses
¿ San Buena Ventura
¿ Small community only around 150 houses
o FUTURE WORK
o Look for at least 8 new communities
¿ Search for communities that fit the prerequisites to start monitoring the water quality.
o Make a brochure to take with to new communities
¿ We need to have something to advertise and explain the plant to new communities. Something that we can leave with contact information and so that the idea is a bit concrete.
o Plan days for presentations, make invitations - trying something new
¿ Instead of presenting to individual communities we would like to identify 5 or more potential communities and invite them to a presentation in Teguc. at the APP office. We would only need one member of the Junta to come. Then we would follow up with leaving a turbidimeter and they would be put on a list of possible plant candidates.
¿ We were thinking that this would show the interest of the community in the plant as well as lower the perception that they will be the next plant site as we would be catering less to individual communities.
o Collect information on possible sites into computer
¿ Make a list of the sites visited and strengths and weaknesses.
o Make a form to communities with which we leave turbidimeters
¿ Antonio has made a form that they will sign about receiving the turbidimeter and leave someone responsible for it.
o Ask SANAA for information on communities
¿ We visited Zanmorano and talked with Erika Tenorio and she suggested a contact with SANAA who has been in charge of monitoring water quality.
o Make a description of the operator (Antonio)
¿ Antonio will think a bit about the ideal operator and the responsibilities that s/he will have and write that up so we have a clear idea to present to communities about what to look for.
La 34 (not till later in the year, closer to rainy season)- John
o Communicate to set up a visit to La 34
o Make minor repairs and capacitate Jose Angel
Marcala - John
o Fred will be coming Feb 25 for a few weeks. He's not sure when they'll be ready to start installing the polycarbonate floc modules, but will let us know. One of more of us will likely go there to help put together the floc modules.
o We might all go to help with training later in the year when the rain comes.