Water ATM

As dawn breaks, two queues start forming at the only petrol pump in Lakshmangarh, a small town in Rajasthan's Alwar district. One, obviously, is of people waiting to get their vehicles' fuel tanks refilled. The other is in front of a simple metal box mounted on the petrol pump's boundary wall. People like to call it ATM machine. But instead of dispensing cash, it gives them clean drinking water.

On her turn, 26-year-old Sapna Jatav takes out a plastic card and holds it in front of a sensor of the water ATM. The sensor reads her card and shows a balance of Rs 130. Jatav places a 10-litre container below a pipe on the water ATM and presses a button. Reverse Osmosis (RO) processed water starts flowing from the pipe. Jatav releases the button when the container is full. The machine calculates the quantity of water dispensed and deducts the amount from her account. One litre costs 50 paisa.

The technological initiative, powered by solar energy, is changing the lives of many in Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh. Earlier, people depended on the saline municipal water or groundwater that has high fluoride content. "Water was not fit even for cooking," says homemaker Rekha Atolia. "Tea would get curdled. Dal would not cook if baking soda was not added to it. When relatives would come, we would buy bottled water," she says.

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4 Comments

1. Very interesting !!!!

2. Dear All, The approach might be a good business solution and also to facilitate safe drinking water. However, the process of discharging the wastewater into the Recharge Pit should be stopped. Because, eventually it will end up with even more TDS in the raw water. In the long run, it might exceed the capacity of the RO plant as well. Rather the the rain water may perhaps be utilised for such recharging. Lastly, a community based large Water Supply Scheme may perhaps be initiated to facilitate safe water to the households for drinking and cooking purpose and till then this approach should be continued as a short term measure only. Thanking you. Regards. Nripendra Kumar Sarma Guwahati, Assam, India

3. I do appreciate your comment; it should be cheaper to pay the cost for treatment and loss of work if get sick through waterborne diseases. In the disaster porn areas where safe water is a serious scare, should adopt such type of practice... have to do research on its feasibility and acceptance in the society, especially among illiterate communities...

4. Awesome initiative... though it seems need to be modify to receive well acceptable safe water that can be use for cooking and drinking purposes... However, only concern is marginalized and poor people haven't ability to buy water in the developing countries...

   1 Comment reply

   1. Perhaps the red plastic cards could be distributed among the poor and marginalized, preloaded with an appropriate amount or configured such that a user can with draw so many litres per day. This is preventative healthcare and presumably a lot cheaper than treating the diseases caused by drinking and cooking with water unfit for human consumption. So many other benefits to society too. Excellent innovation