Starter Kit. Idea 414 of 500. Cluster 21
Rainwater-harvesting installation for the dry-zone villages and the hotels
The mechanism, from the book
The sun shines on every roof and the island imports its fuel.
The first step
Go to a dry-zone village before the rains and ask the families who buy water by the bowser what they spend in a dry month. Measure one roof, work out how much it could catch, and quote a tank and gutters installed at a fixed price. Do the same with the manager of the nearest hotel. The proof is a deposit or a signed quote from either.
- Who pays first
- A hotel manager who pays for water deliveries in the dry season, since a tank that fills itself pays back in bills they already see.
- What leaves today
- Rain that falls free runs to waste while villages and hotels pay for trucked water; a tank turns a recurring bill into an asset that stays put.
Ask first
- the local council (Municipal Council, Urban Council or Pradeshiya Sabha). Ask whether tanks and gutters on homes or hotels need any approval.
- the Divisional Secretariat. Ask which villages in the division buy water most in dry months.
Check before you spend
The roof's strength for gutters, safe storage so tanks do not breed mosquitoes, and whether the water will be for drinking or only washing.
Find out these three numbers
- What do families spend on water in a dry month?
- How much could one roof catch in a season?
- What do a tank and gutters cost installed?
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.