We welcome gifts of stock and securities, can help process any matching gifts, and would be honored to dicuss Planned Giving with you.
Please contact our office by clicking below, emailing us at [email protected], or call 603.369.3858.
Contact Us »
The Water Project
PO Box 3353
Concord, NH 03302-3353
1.603.369.3858
Rooftops, gutters and large holding tanks divert and store rainwater.
The Water Project completes RainWater Catchment projects at schools, where on-site, safe water keeps kids in school. Water is collected off of specific areas of a roof, enters a custom guttering system (which filters out debris) and leads to a storage tank. Tanks can vary in sizes and are determined by the population of the school and average rainfall patterns. Water can be stored for months, is easily treated in the tank, and is accessible through taps on the tank.
The Water Project implements this technology in areas where we are also providing other community water projects. We believe if kids are able to get safe water at home, they should also get it at school (and vice versa!). We give RainWater Catchment an A+!
Seasonal streams (and the sand they carry) are trapped by sub-surface dams, replenishing the water table and allowing for hand-dug wells.
When climate change means drought, its effects are devastating for water resource management and food security. Just ask farmers in Southeastern Kenya. Our work in this region is among communities who have relied on farming from generation to generation. In this region, rain was never a problem in the past but now it rains a few times a year and flash floods momentarily fill dry river-beds again. Water comes and goes, and things go back to dry.
Sand dams are miraculous and we’ve watched this technology restore the desert back into the Garden of Eden. Almost completely led by community-supplied sweat and materials, and under the supervision of engineers, dams are strategically placed within those dry river-beds. The next time it rains, flood-waters are trapped. What remains is water and sand – and that’s where the magic happens.
If you’ve ever been to the beach, you know what happens when you dig a foot down into the sand. You hit water. That’s because sand is remarkably good at holding water.
With a sand dam, this trapped sand begins to hold millions of gallons of rainwater. Soon enough, sand reaches the top of the dam, allowing water to continue downstream – where it meets the next dam. The result? A regional water table is restored. A new opportunity to implement dug wells to provide safe water (because the earth acts as a natural filter) is created. And, farmers can get back to what they do best – growing food!
A reliable, naturally flowing spring is made safe by protecting the source, and creating easy community access.
In many communities, natural springs exist. They always have. Water seems to be coming from nowhere, but we know it’s really coming from rocks and the earth – which acts as a natural filtration system for water. And, because springs provide reliable water, they are the go-to for a community’s water source. However, reliable doesn’t mean safe. Left open as they are, bad things happen to really good water sources – things like surface contamination, animal and human waste and rain runoff. The solution is to protect the source. First, you excavate around the exact source area of the spring. Then, you build a protective reservoir for water flow, which leads to a concrete spring box and collection area. Safe water typically flows year-round and there is very limited ongoing maintenance needed! You’ve just helped make reliable water, reliable and safe water.
Community education and self-discovery about hygiene and sanitation concepts lead to improved health.
Because things like wells, springs and dams are so tangible and so easily photographed – we often think those things are the whole point. Truth be told, there are plenty of contractors who can simply install water and sanitation hardware and nothing else.
Improved health is the point. That’s why hygiene and sanitation training is so critical. The Water Project utilizes many different methods for this training, depending on the community/institution, program and country. The point is education… leading to self-discovery within the community…leading to new health habits. Training topics always include things like disease transmission, personal hygiene and cleanliness, proper disposal of waste and proper water storage methods.
While we know this training provides thoughtful engagement, the community is the lead partner here. Our role is to make clear to them the power they have within themselves to bring about improved health.
A specialized drilling team drills into the earth in search of an underground aquifer.
Girls and women walk long distances for water when sometimes, safe water is right under their feet! Underground rivers, called aquifers, often contain a constant supply of safe water – but you have to get to it. Enter, the drilled well. There are many forms of drilling, depending on what you are drilling through. No matter what machine or piece of equipment is used, all drilling is aiming for a borehole that reaches into an aquifer. If the aquifer has water - and after the well is developed, sanitary seal and concrete apron installed - we’re able to pull water to the surface utilizing a hand-pump. If all goes as planned, the community is left with a safe, closed water source providing around 5 gallons of water a minute through a hand-pump.
(Note: Dry wells are a reality – you really don’t know the quality and quantity of water until you finish drilling and start test pumping the well. Hand-Pumps associated with drilled and dug wells currently require substantial ongoing support from The Water Project.)
We'll send you updates about the specific project you support. Pictures, maps, and stories from these communities will help you understand your impact.
Over time, we'll also provide you access to our monitoring data, so you'll know that water is still flowing, years after your gift.
100% Accountability. 100% Transparency.
We welcome gifts of stock and securities, can help process any matching gifts, and would be honored to dicuss Planned Giving with you.
Please contact our office by clicking below, emailing us at [email protected], or call 603.369.3858.
Contact Us »
The Water Project
PO Box 3353
Concord, NH 03302-3353
1.603.369.3858
Hundreds of communities are in need of
immediate water project funding.
See How to Help:
Every gift funds a specific water project. You'll receive a full report with pictures, maps, stories and more from the community where your gift is used.
Every water project requires an entire community to do their part.
Donate your share and bring clean water to a community today.
Or, Sponsor a Water Project starting at $5,500
Provide the majority or total funding for a water project.
You'll know your gift made clean water possible for a community in need.
Or, Invest in a Regional Water Program starting at $35,000
Investments over $35,000 enable large scale water projects with far reaching impact.
The impact of your investment at this scale will extend beyond safe water and sanitation to include climate change mitigation, sustainable agriculture, re-forestation and more.
Your giving enables long-lasting, transformational water projects that serve thousands and allow landscapes to flourish once again.
Please contact us to discuss the pressing need for investment at this scale.
The Water Project has experience helping communities drill boreholes, dig wells, construct small sub-surface dams, catch rain, protect fresh-water springs, filter surface water, and maintain proper sanitation and hygiene practices.
We have learned each community we serve is different. From basic geology, to climate and culture, many factors determine the most sustainable project type to provide access to clean and safe water.
When students are freed from gathering water, they return to class. With proper and safe latrines, girls stay in school through their teenage years.
Safe water, clean hands, healthy bodies. Time lost to sickness is reduced and people can get back to the work of lifting themselves out of poverty.
Access to water leads to food security. With less crop loss, hunger is reduced. Schools can feed students with gardens, reducing costs.
Access to water can break the cycle of poverty. The communities we serve are ready to grow. We can't wait to see how they choose to do it.
For each project you support, you'll receive an in-depth project report detailing the technology used, the location of the effort, the number of people it serves, and photographs of the process and completed water project.
If your project's total expenses are less than your gift, we'll show you any additional project(s) you've supported as well! For larger gifts, there may instances in which you'll be the sole sponsor on multiple projects.
We work hard to make sure that a community's needs are always considered first. Our partners in the field help ensure that happens and we work with them to make the best possible decisions.
We've heard too many stories of a "default" technology, like a well, being installed because of a donor's preference, only to see that same project rejected or abandoned by a community who were never involved in the process. We're here to lend a hand, not lead the way.
We hope you'll join us in working to put others' needs first.
The process of sponsoring a water project in Africa is simple.
Once you have raised the money and/or made a donation to The Water Project, Inc., we will assign the gifts to the next available project site on our ever-growing list.
We work very hard to keep our implementers busy, and try to ensure they always have a back-log of work. That simply means that your project will be constructed about 8-12 months after your donation.
We won't send your donation to the field until just before it's ready to begin construction - keeping everything safe, secure...and accountable.
A water project costs more than just the hardware.
To ensure each project is done right and lasts for many years, there are three essential phases to every project including:
The majority of your donation goes to our field implementers in the construction phase. They use it to pay for supplies, well pumps, concrete, drill bits, wear and tear on the rigs, fuel, and wages for the drill crews.
When you sponsor an entire project, you'll be an integral part of the effort from the very beginning to clean water flowing and throughout its lifetime! We'll show you how all along the way.
Currently, we're working to fund new wells, well rehabilitations, rain water catchments and spring protection schemes at schools, medical clinics, and churches and community centers in Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Uganda. Individual sites are each open to the public and can serve large groups of people.
Our teams and partners prepare each community for their new water water project. They ensure the community is committed to the project, and in most cases will require some form of investment of time and/or money on their part. This is a critical step to ensure that a water project is sustainable so that your investment has the longest possible effect.
We're committed to providing a reasonable estimate of usage. It doesn't help anyone to overstate the true impact of a water project.
Most of our recent projects actually serve around 500 people, which we consider the upper end of a reasonable limit for any hand-pumped well. Spring catchments serve around 200 or so.
Still, the number of people who use a water project will vary by location. If you've seen claims of wells serving thousands, ask questions. It's important to realize that simply because a community has a population of 1,000 people, it does not mean a single project can serve them all.
An overused well, for example, won't last very long.
Managing a water project over time is just as important as how many people it can serve. To make sure the projects we fund last as long as possible, we go back and check to find out what's working and what's not. We work hard to do the greatest good with your gifts.
Properly maintained, a pump can provide clean, safe drinking water for upwards of ten years or so before needing a complete overhaul or replacement. Properly maintained, other types of projects can last even longer.
Yes, of course! Our implementation teams are great at sending pictures and updates back to us as they work. We'll pass those on to you through our Project Reports - listing you and your team
as the sponsors (you can choose to remain anonymous too).
You'll be able to track your specific project from its beginning, through construction and for many years to come.
Proving water projects and wells is hard work, but we believe it's essential to building trust through transparency.
We ask our drillers to send pictures of the actual drilling process when possible. In many cases we're provided with before and after photos.
In addition to pictures, we insist that every well be documented with Govt. drilling permits and GPS coordinates. We have folks on our team visit random wells, using these coordinates, to keep everyone honest.
Finally, we ask for itemized expense reports and copies of deposit/withdrawal forms from the banks to which we wire funds for projects. We trust our teams, but also try to remove any opportunity for others to question their integrity.
At this time, we are not able to ensure either safe travel or participation by volunteers at water projects in the field.
Well drilling is specialized work carried out by trained professionals and it is often quite dangerous. Our teams, made up of local drilling techs, don't have the ability to manage visits while they work.
The locations in which they work are often very remote and not frequented by foreigners.