(July 17, 2014 - by Ruth Pike) Many of us have an ambivalent relationship with communications technology—we’re addicted to it, yet we bemoan the constant interruptions it brings.

According to a Nielsen study, the average American owns four digital devices and spends 60 hours a week consuming digital content. Yet the rising popularity of “digital detox” or “tech-free” vacations suggests that many of us in the West romanticize the idea of remote destinations, free from the world of technology.

In places like the Ecuadorian Amazon communities of Washintza and Iniayua—at least a full day’s trek or a half-hour flight from the nearest town—the buzz of birds and wildlife replaces the ringing of cell phones and the ping of incoming emails.

But there’s also a downside to being so isolated. What happens if there is a medical emergency? What will you do if your water system or well breaks (assuming, of course, that you have a clean water supply)?

According to a 2009 report by the Rural Water Supply Network, approximately 35 percent of water well hand pumps in Africa were out of service.

In the absence of local maintenance skills or communication infrastructure, a broken well means a return to high disease levels and heightened infant mortality rates.

A group of mechanical and software engineers from the HCJB Global Technology Center in Elkhart, Ind. (a ministry of Reach Beyond) and Water Technologies International decided to address this issue, focusing initially on the Central African Republic (CAR).

They looked for a way to enable quicker detection of maintenance issues and to save unnecessary travel time and expense for local mechanics and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) by eliminating the need to check on fully functioning pumps in person.

A remote monitoring system would be the perfect fit, but what technology could they use? Implementing the cell phone network (Global System for Mobile Communications or GSM) might have been the obvious solution, but in a place with limited cell coverage, this was not feasible.

One day the team of engineers had a brainwave: satellite technology. Building and expanding on a concept for satellite monitoring developed by hydrogeological consultant Stuart Dykstra, the engineers devised an innovative approach to monitoring water systems using satellites. Two years later, they are in the final testing stage before rolling out full production of the monitoring technology.

The system will collect data and transmit it via satellite to a cloud-based server, enabling key information about the pumps (such as water flow rate) to be accessed on a website anywhere in the world.

The original plan had been to test the equipment in CAR, but political turmoil and violence prevented the units from being installed. At IPWE 2014 (International Perspectives on Water Resources and the Environment), an event held in Quito earlier this year, Stephen Peacock, a machinist based in Elkhart, presented a paper titled, “An Improved Method for Rural Well Hand Pump Monitoring.”

During the conference he had the opportunity to meet with colleagues from Reach Beyond’s community development team in Ecuador, leading to a new idea for testing and using the technology.
 
“[We] figured out that the system we had would be just perfect for the jungles where there’s no electricity and there are no cell towers,” said Peacock, who is heading the manufacturing aspect of the project.

At the beginning of July, staff members from Elkhart traveled to Ecuador to install the technology on water systems in both Iniayua and Washintza as well as Reach Beyond’s guesthouse in the jungle town of Shell.

The purpose of their visit was twofold. Firstly, for members of the technology development team, real-time data will prove invaluable as they look to move from the design and prototype stages to full production; secondly, it will bring immediate benefits to missionaries working on water projects in Ecuador.

“The satellite monitoring system enables us to collect data that helps to evaluate and improve water systems,” explained Wim de Groen, Reach Beyond’s director of water projects in Ecuador.

Data from the monitoring system will enable missionaries to answer questions such as, How does the community use the water? When do they use it most? Does the system keep up with demand?

“From the office here you can know exactly how the system is working,” said Peacock. “You can know the efficiency of the system, you can gauge what the demand from the people is on the system and you can work out from the solar intensity how well the pump is pumping.”

“And you can tell if the pump breaks,” added Project Manager Jeff Benedict. For Reach Beyond staff working on water projects in Ecuador, being able to identify any maintenance issues will save both time and money, reducing the number of flights into remote communities and enabling resources to be invested in reaching more communities.

Upon completing their trip to Ecuador, the technology team will be working with another organization, Design Outreach, to fit monitoring units on their pumps, beginning with 25 pumps in August as part of a 100-pump project across Uganda, Malawi and Kenya.

The team anticipates that many other organizations will be able to benefit from this technology in the future.

“Our focus will be Christian non-profits—likeminded ministries,” concluded Benedict.

Sources: Reach Beyond, Nielsen, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Purple Travel Blog, Rural Water Supply Network