Friday, September 13, 3:19 PM
Maybe I should be a tab bit more serious after my last blog?
The past few days have seen marked progress in our project. After our initial escapades at IMAP, we decided we should split up to get more work done in different areas. Irene, Jamel, and Eduardo stayed at IMAP to get a tour of different greywater reuse systems they have built, receive their theoretical information, constructed a practice distribution system for one of the existing banana rings, and tested our lysimeters (devices capable of extracting water from soil at various depths).
Soraya, Matt, Ariel, and I left for Chocola so we could take greywater samples from the community. We planned to take the samples Wednesday morning and bring them back to the lake for testing. We took a map of the community that Semillas Para El Futuro (the NGO) had and added locations of houses and nearby rivers.
My group split up and had Soraya and Matt take samples to the laboratory of Universidad Del Valle in Solola where Margaret Dix, a British doctor at the university and friend of Dr. Eliska Rejmankova (faculty at UC Davis), let us test our samples for levels of nitrates (NO3), orthophosphates (PO4), ammonia (NH3), and pH.
Ariel and I took samples to the laboratory of AMSCLAE (the government's Lake authority) in Panajachel where we took measurements of salinity, total dissolved solids, conductivity, E. coli, and total coliform. The latter two required incubation of petrifilms which AMSCLAE was gracious enough to lend to us. These tests are indicators of how "grey" the greywater is and with them we can gauge the Chocola's water situation much better and do pilot studies back in Davis with much more accuracy.
Once we reunite Saturday, the team is going to have to critically think about what we want the pilot systems in Chocola to look like. We have decided on four sites and have a list of locations to select from. We also have agreements we are going to make with the laboratories and Semillas Para El Futuro to ensure testing of the pilot systems while we are gone.
Things are going well. I am glad that we have made such progress and hope everything goes as planned from here on out. But my hopes and my expectations are quite different. With all the intricacies of this project, I can guarantee things will change... and often.
But isn't that what makes this whole thing fun to begin with?
Imaan Taghavi, undergraduate student, civil engineering, UC Davis
Maybe I should be a tab bit more serious after my last blog?
The past few days have seen marked progress in our project. After our initial escapades at IMAP, we decided we should split up to get more work done in different areas. Irene, Jamel, and Eduardo stayed at IMAP to get a tour of different greywater reuse systems they have built, receive their theoretical information, constructed a practice distribution system for one of the existing banana rings, and tested our lysimeters (devices capable of extracting water from soil at various depths).
Soraya, Matt, Ariel, and I left for Chocola so we could take greywater samples from the community. We planned to take the samples Wednesday morning and bring them back to the lake for testing. We took a map of the community that Semillas Para El Futuro (the NGO) had and added locations of houses and nearby rivers.
My group split up and had Soraya and Matt take samples to the laboratory of Universidad Del Valle in Solola where Margaret Dix, a British doctor at the university and friend of Dr. Eliska Rejmankova (faculty at UC Davis), let us test our samples for levels of nitrates (NO3), orthophosphates (PO4), ammonia (NH3), and pH.
Ariel and I took samples to the laboratory of AMSCLAE (the government's Lake authority) in Panajachel where we took measurements of salinity, total dissolved solids, conductivity, E. coli, and total coliform. The latter two required incubation of petrifilms which AMSCLAE was gracious enough to lend to us. These tests are indicators of how "grey" the greywater is and with them we can gauge the Chocola's water situation much better and do pilot studies back in Davis with much more accuracy.Once we reunite Saturday, the team is going to have to critically think about what we want the pilot systems in Chocola to look like. We have decided on four sites and have a list of locations to select from. We also have agreements we are going to make with the laboratories and Semillas Para El Futuro to ensure testing of the pilot systems while we are gone.
But isn't that what makes this whole thing fun to begin with?
Imaan Taghavi, undergraduate student, civil engineering, UC Davis
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