Purpose of Water Retention Ponds (2.1)

[Mathew YeohParticipant]

I wanted to find out the purpose of the Household Retention Ponds. It is a little open ended. Parts of the brief mentions water use for aqua culture, but the existing pictures makes it seem like the water is mainly for household use.

Is using it for hydroponics the level of required design (Or a potentially optional requirement)? Or something simpler?

Also what is the required water storage amount? I remember the brief said 3-4 households per pond.

Also how clean does the water need to be? Or is filtration required? Should it be drinking quality (either directly or after boiling)? or “taking a bath”/watering plants quality? Or clean enough for fish/animals/etc to use?

[Anthony BradyKeymaster]

Hi Mathew,

Thank you for your questions.

We have tried to provide students with a range of project opportunities with varying levels of openness so that there is room for students to come up with their own ideas/opportunities, if they choose.

As per the design brief, “Loidahar experiences seasonal challenges in ensuring reliable access to safe and clean water. Geography and environmental factors exacerbate water scarcity and quality issues. Addressing these challenges is vital to community health, livelihoods, and to foster sustainable development.”

The addition of household retention ponds is one opportunity to help alleviate water challenges in Loidahar. How that water is used will depend on a range of factors (which you have already started to identify) that you will need to consider in your design e.g. water storage capacity and intended use (drinking, bathing, farming, etc.). There are advantages and disadvantages to water retention ponds which you will need to investigate during the design process.

Specifically, hydroponics wouldn’t be appropriate as the soil within Loidahar is already fertile; they can grow a wide array of crops already. There are 11no. existing retention ponds that support community potable supply along with concrete storage tanks which supply 4-5 households. This particular design opportunity is for household level ponds (non-potable) which are cheap and easy to create. These could be used to support small quantities of fish or used as a domestic water point for farming animals. By creating these supplementary household ponds, it allows villagers to preserve their existing potable supply for drinking and cooking.

These are all great questions to be thinking about and I would encourage you to take some more time to review the design brief, additional information resources, and do some of your own research to understand the context of Loidahar and the particular challenge/opportunity you want to solve.

Happy to answer any further questions you have.

Cheers,
Anthony

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