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Submitted by Haitian Relief Services, a non-profit organization located in River Falls, Wisconsin.

Haitian relief Services (HRS) Haitian Relief Services is a small, registered 501(c)3 non-profit in River Falls, Wisconsin that has historically been working in Haiti. In 2002, working in cooperation with Food for the Poor and seven River Falls churches, we funded and began construction on twenty five houses that were completed and dedicated in 2004. We also funded the construction of an elementary school / high school that was completed and dedicated in Ganthier, Haiti in 2010. At this time we are fund raising to support the school, and have also developed the jatropha farming plan described in this proposal that, when funded, will have a very favorable, long term, impact on the economy in Haiti. Environmental and Economic Situation in Haiti Lush, virgin forest covered 60 percent of Haiti’s land and mountainous regions in 1925. Since that time, Haiti has been deforested to the point where only 2 percent of the forest cover remains. The recent logging has occurred primarily to support the production of charcoal, a commonly used source of cooking fuel. The deforestation has created serious erosion, flooding, and desertification problems. Soil run-off has destroyed farmland soils and polluted near-shore ocean fisheries. Reforestation efforts have been unsuccessful due to the fact that charcoal continues to be a main source of cooking fuel. Ganthier, Haiti Since we have been working in the Ganthier area and know the mayor and many of its residents very well, we propose to begin the project there. The farming model could then be replicated in other Haitian communities as will be discussed later in this proposal. Ganthier is a village (area) located approximately 25 miles southeast of Port-au-Prince, just south of Lake Azuei (see the map below). The community is spread out over 190 square miles and had, before the earthquake, an estimated population of 71,000 residents. People in Ganthier face a challenge every day to obtain food and water. Often, water must be carried in buckets or trucked in from distant springs. Because of the demands placed on survival, many children do not have the opportunity to seek an education. Less than 12% of the children attend school grades K-12. Average cost for school is about $250 annually per child. Twenty per cent of the children in Haiti will die before the age of 5. Of the population, 70% lives below poverty level. Thirty per cent of the Haitian population is either ill and or malnourished. The long term impact of this project will be to change these numbers for the better. One goal of this project is to provide resource people and volunteers with a place to stay while in Haiti working on the project. They will then provide education and oversight of the project that will ultimately make it sustainable. The guest house will serve this purpose. Proposed Jatropha Farming Project The development of jatropha farming is the major thrust of this proposal. The goal of this project is, beginning with the Haitian village of Ganthier, to develop a farming model that can provide Ganthier and other areas of Haiti with a self sustaining income and a much needed economy. This project introduces a farming concept that can provide much needed employment for a very impoverished country. The project involves introducing a plant called Jatropha. This plant produces seeds that when crushed produce a fuel that can be used almost without any further processing. The fuel can be used in lamps, cooking stoves, and unsophisticated diesel engines without further treatment. When processed into biodiesel it can also be used to fuel vehicles such as cars and trucks. This further processing is needed to remove naturally occurring waxing agents in the oil. The waxing agents, when removed, are a useful byproduct in themselves. Jatropha Curcas The following is a summary of information on Jatropha available on the internet. Most current information comes from India, a nation that is taking Jatropha very seriously. The State Government of Uttar Pradesh, India has decided to encourage farmers to grow Jatropha on about 2.5 million acres of wastelands in 30 of its districts.

The Jatropha plant, native to Central America, South America, and Africa has been in existence for 70 million years. It can be cultivated at elevations up to 3600 meters (12,000 ft). It grows best in rain-fed, drought-prone areas (much of Haiti), where seed yield and oil content are both higher than when it is grown using irrigation. It is fast growing and has a life of 40-60 years. The plant and seeds are toxic to animals and birds and are therefore not bothered by either. Jatropha oil is obtained by pressing the seeds produced in the fruit of the plant and, when processed into biodiesel, is a real and cost effective substitute for hydraulic fluid and diesel oil. Many byproducts of the production process are also useful. It is used in medicines, tooth powder, oil based soap, eco-friendly pesticides, and as a natural fence for orchards and farms.

Jatropha will grow in a tropical climate in any non-loam soil having no water logging. It propagates by seeds or plants. To use it as a fence requires 190 plants per acre. Intercropping provides 625 plants per acre and dense cropping can provide 1000 plants per acre. We plan to plant 700 seedlings per acre. Beginning with the third year, it yields about 4.0 kilograms of dry seeds per plant per year for up to 40-60 years.

Other herbal crops can be intercropped with Jatropha to improve the economic viability, especially during the first three years, if desired.

Several reasons why this particular crop would be beneficial to Haiti are listed below:
1. Haiti has a desperate need for employment and jatropha is a labor intensive crop, especially suited for a country where jobs are scarce and salaries are low.
2. Jatropha, through greening, will add nutrients to the soil, check erosion, and stop land degradation.
3. It provides an alternative to charcoal as a cooking fuel, and it has been the production of charcoal that has lead to the deforestation and degradation of Haiti’s soil.
4. The biodiesel oil produced is environmentally friendly and in great demand.
5. If developed sufficiently it will reduce dependence on crude oil imports and provide energy security, especially in rural areas.

The plant itself is resistant to drought and high winds and can be planted on wasteland. It will grow almost anywhere, even on gravel, sandy, and saline and low nutrient soils. It can thrive on the poorest stony soil and even will grow in rock crevices. It thrives on 10 cm of rain a year. The life expectancy of a plant is approximately forty – sixty years, so replanting is not needed.
The use of pesticides and other polluting substances are not necessary, due to the pesticide and fungicidal properties of the plant.

The Jatropha plant has many additional purposeful uses as listed below:
1. Its leaves can be eaten once steamed or stewed. When crushed it can be applied near horses’ or donkey’s eyes to repel flies. The plant also absorbs 18 lbs of carbon dioxide per year.
2. The nuts are sometimes roasted and eaten. They can also be burned like candle nuts when strung on grass. They have also been used as a contraceptive.
3. Each tree produces about 4 kg of seeds per year. Seeds contain about 40% oil. Planted at 700 trees per acre, each acre will produce about 330 gallons of biodiesel per year when in full production (after three years). When crushed and processed the oil can be used for lamps, cook stoves, diesel engines, soap and candles. The residue can be processed further into biomass to power electricity plants; it can also be used as feeders for fertilizers. The fruits and seeds of the Jatropha in a raw form can be highly toxic, but toxicity is reduced after roasting.
4. Ashes from burning the roots are used as a salt substitute.
5. The bark can be used as a fish poison.
6. The latex strongly inhibits the watermelon mosaic virus
7. The sap stains linen and is sometimes used for marking.

For this project the main use will be of the seeds for lamp and stove fuel, and for biodiesel. Another huge benefit will be the reforestation of the land that was once a lush rainforest with plentiful rain, but now has been cleared of most of its trees. Today the land is baron and rainfall has been reduced to about 12 cm per year in the Ganthier area. When it does rain, erosion of the land occurs. The planting of Jatropha plants will prevent erosion and help return the climate to a normal state.

The Jatropha Farming Plan The total land needed for this project, provided by Ganthier, is 22 hectares (55 acres) for the first year and 50 acres per year for the next seven years. One acre (0.4 hectare) will be needed for the nursery, four acres (1.6 hectares) will be needed for the production facility, and fifty acres (20 hectares) will be allocated to four farms of 12.5 acres each.

Each 12.5 acre farm will need a team of four farmers because there will be much labor intensive work to be done. The 12.5 acres will be allocated as follows: two acres will be needed for living quarters for four families and other buildings (maintenance, storage, processing, etc.), ten acres for Jatropha fields, and a half acre for miscellaneous use (garden, etc.).

All major farm and processing equipment will be used on a communal basis. There are two approaches that can be taken here. The land in the Ganthier area is covered with heavy scrub brush that will be very difficult to remove in a reasonable time frame without at least one significant tractor. Additional heavy equipment, such as a tracked dozer and/or trackhoe, if available, would speed the process of clearing land. This equipment could be very well utilized, especially if the initial Ganthier project is replicated in other areas of Haiti. Such heavy equipment would also be very useful in any attempt to harvest water requiring the construction of earthen dams. Unfortunately, it adds considerably to the initial cost of the project. The plan discussed in this proposal therefore assumes the purchase of a tractor, digger, and wagon. The heavier equipment, if available, would clear land in the Ganthier area for one year and then move to other sites. There will still be plenty of work to be done by laborers, as jatropha farming is labor intensive from beginning land preparation to final product. First year capital investment will be needed for 16 modest farm homes, one tractor, one digger, one wagon, and a machinery storage shed. The cost of these items and a more detailed start up plan can be obtained from:

Curt Larson
curtiss.o.larson@uwrf.edu
737 South Fork Drive
River Falls, WI 54022
715-425-5130

ECOsmarte wants to help the Haitian people.

DESALINATION SYSTEM with 2 million gallon per day capacity (to water all of Port Au Prince) Price Tag: $2.0 million USD: Engineering, Grant Writers and ECOsmarte team are being assembled.

TILAPIA FARM Price Tag: $250,000 USD. Donations to HealingHaiti.org

ECOsmarte’s Norway Representative:

I have been in meeting with the director of public health in Norway and he is open for approving ECOsmarte in Norway if we can document the health-bringing with this system. They require documents from a third-party company with a detailed chemical explanation for both ionization and oxidation. They focus on killing bacteria outside copper, because copper alone not killing all relevant bacteria. He try to understand the oxidation process but he argument that there are none statement of production long-time oxidation with this system. The systems seems to only produce short-time oxidation like Ozone not stuffs like adding the chemical peroxomonosulphate. He also argument that this systems is not chlorine free because there always been some salt in water after bathing people. This salt will then generate very small dosis of chlorine when passing the titan electrodes. This side-effects maybe help the systems to function without mean it. Did you have some test documents from third-party?

ECOsmarte:

Are we looking for a commercial approval or residential as we beleive in the Candian/EU where trace chlorine is used for public pools, as well as the count for total swimmers.

ECOsmarte’s Norway Representative:

The system is intended to approve for both installations; Commercial/Public and residential. To get this approved we have to do it first for commercial use, then they accept it of course for private pools.

In Norway they have recently changed the national requirements for commercial pool regarding the earlier min contents of 0.5ppm chlorine. They accept other chemicals and methods if we secure as chlorine to the pipe system, buffer tank, pumps, filter and pool.

We need then to verify the function of the oxidation. Copper are all ready very known.

ECOsmarte:

Has Norway looked at copper only with active oxygen?

The potassium peroxymonopersulphate is nothing but active oxygen. It leaves no residual other than higher Dissolved Oxygen (DO) levels which ECOsmarte accomplishes with the titanium/platinum anodes. It clearly looks like Norway wishes to set standards not involving chlorine residual. It is likely an ECOsmarte pool has 3.0 DO in the source water and 6.0 to 7.0 after running the oxygen for about a week, both residentially and commercially. The maximum DO I have ever seen with the potassium based non-chlorine shocking is 7.5 which I also see on some ECOsmarte pools. 6.5 is our absolutely crystal clear happy pool owner. At 8.0 the pool is cloudy with micro bubbles typically.

The silver is a regulated toxic and not desired by the EU, US, Canada, Australia or Germany which all have restrictions on free and total chlorine and offer dispensation for copper ppm, nothing for silver ppb which is the outcome on a 90/10 or 96/4 copper silver anode. Silver is only of benefit in out of control microbe environments where it inactivates reproduction only, does not really kill. By stopping reproduction it allows the copper to catch-up on the microbe killing. We have not found a single microbe in sixteen years that silver kills in parts per BILLION that is not killed by copper in parts per MILLION.

Normally if any ionization system is approved we go thru easy and I am looking for the best science package we can put together. We are obviously compatible with the potassium peroxymonopersulphate standard, probably needed on commercial pools with high bather loads anyway. I think the answer is to allow approval without the silver which is the current (or last eight years) ionization world class build platform. The copper/silver has simply been out there longer and it stains the pool with a photographic reaction, silver oxide as with photography. It is also highly restricted in backwash or discharge, particularly as water is exchanged at 35 liters per swimmer per day in the EU, Germany, Canada and Australian standards or 5 per cent every day with ignorant regulators that don’t count swimmers in the US and Asia.

Feel free to re-circulate this info. We haven’t made a copper/silver anode for ten years or so but could do so for public pools in Norway only if needed. We do have a new public pools discussion to the EU model at www.ecosmarte.com/publicpools.html. We only install US public pools willing to count swimmers and operate on the EU standards which require .4ppm, .5ppm free chlorine and total chlorine cannot exceed 1.5. Maximum swimmers are regulated and 35 liters of water per swimmer per day are exchanged. Canada, Australia and Germany have slightly more restrictive and lower total chlorine tolerances.

One other key point on public pools. Conventional sand will filter at 50 Microns typically with human skin and blood cells averaging 9 micron. Each 30 minute swimmer ex foliates 1 BILLION Skin Cells. The only way human cells predictably leave a sand filtered pool is with a shock or a floc. With the ECOsmarte Glass Media filters the micron outcome is 2 to 5 microns -- pulling the cells (alive or dead) out of the pools without shock or flocculent. In May or June our Glasspack will receive the NSF 50 rating to go in all sand filters globally.

We are hopeful it will also receive the NSF 61 for drinking water approval just to demonstrate efficacy. This is a big deal for ECOsmarte and for public safety. We put over 1,000 metric tons out in 2010, representing 6,000 to 7,000 pools we believe.

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When Glen Hyde was developing his airport hanger loft condos in 2001, he knew his 50 grain hard Texas well water would scale the pipe in the 2 mile water distribution system, particularly if he was chlorinating the water as Texas wanted.

Further, softening the water would add operating expenses for this private airport and labor requirements not available when he was required to fly to a client’s plane and in some cases rebuild a jet engine over a number of days. Hyde also did not believe the brine discharge or “soapy” shower water was desirable for his property owners.

Hyde’s first step was to attend state of Texas courses to get himself certified as a water district operator, a requirement in numerous states when a community well serves more than six residences. Secondly, Hyde needed an “Environmental Technology” application for his hybrid ECOsmarte system.

“Certified Water District Operator Glen Hyde knew that if chlorine was required in his two inch, two mile distribution network he would shortly have flow problems due to scale and softening was prohibitively expensive in terms of maintenance and time.”

Hyde knew the challenge was to get bicarbonate calcium to prevent scale buildup across the 2 miles the PVC distribution system ran. Hyde figured that the ionization levels from ECOsmarte could be measured at the furthest point to confirm viable scale and bacteria control, and knew he needed Texas approval to pellet chlorinate at the well, remove all of the chlorine with a granular activated carbon tower (90 GPM) and insert the ECOsmarte electronic ionization and oxygenation system post GAC filter and in line.

Hyde was an early student of bicarbonate CA2H (CO3) vs. carbonate calcium (CACO3) and had no automatic dishwashers only laundry in his planned 160, 1 bedroom lofts. He secured his Watercheck® analysis to confirm nearly all of his hardness was calcium and secured the necessary filters and valves from the local Culligan distributor. Chlorine is measured prior to the GAC filter at about 1.0ppm, after the filter at ZERO, and ionization at .1ppm at the furthest controlled faucet, 2 miles from the treatment point.

With the recent passing of California AB 1366, the use of an “automatic self regenerating water softener” has over 100 cities implementing a ban and the local water districts furnish a complete list of approved alternatives.

Dale Price had no illusions that a 60,000 gallon pond would operate crystal clear with the “natural” biological filters proposed by local pond builders in the mid 1990’s. His first attempts were unsuccessful as the pH of the pond water wanted to be 8.5.

Price knew that as the KOI fish grew he would be violating every pound per gallon rule in the KOI books. With his wife, a veterinarian, he embarked on a one year build and water treatment effort to have one of the most valuable KOI collections in the U.S. displayed in crystal clear water with unique flora on the bottom.

The pond is twelve feet deep, oval in shape with a complete water garden bottom. A small peninsula protrudes so he can ring his liberty bell to summon fish for feeding, often from the hand.

Price first began with a 30 GPM well water turbo system from ECOsmarte to treat his home, irrigation and auto fill needs for the pond. The natural oxygen and ionization chambers for the home resulted in .10 to .15 ppm residual copper going into both his
residence and the pond on the replenishment water.

The residual was never measured however in the main pond, probably due to the 2 900lb bubble bead biological filters. Upon ECOsmarte’s recommendation Price installed 2 Zeolite filters with an ECOsmarte KOI oxygen system to prevent ammonia buildup from the large KOI, harmful both to the KOI and their water garden plants. The CO2 ph injection system from ECOsmarte was also required to keep the pond from reaching the 8.0ph that existed in Price’s well, particularly after the daily KOI feeding. Ph was ultimately maintained in a 7.2 to 7.6 range with carbon dioxide injected 24/7 and even backed up by a sulphuric acid injector that kicked on by sensor when ph levels hit 7.5.

The pond hit 80-90% clarity on a daily basis, still not acceptable for Price and the pond also developed periodic string algae. With his wife’s, the veterinarian, help Price decided to introduce copper to the pond to get rid of the string algae and strive for 95-100% daily clarity in the 12 foot deep pond. Veterinarians and fish stores had used low level packaged copper but always indicated to consumers that copper was toxic to KOI.

With daily monitoring of the copper levels, .10, .15, .20 and finally .25ppm copper was introduced with the KOI fish monitored. Price reported at .25ppm his fish “were not happy” and levels were scaled back to .15ppm - - enough to eliminate string algae and get clarity to almost “mirror quality”.

In 2004 Scott Wagner was prepared to spend nearly $250,000 for a reverse osmosis system to treat his problem well water at his annual flower growing operation in Ham Lake, MN. He was not prepared, however, to absorb the $30,000 annual operating cost in membranes, salt and increased electricity expenses and was acutely aware of the environmental issues.

“The ECOsmarte irrigation system has proven a cost effective solution to our 3 parts iron and 2 full parts manganese well water,” says Scott Wagner. “Our superintendent now takes 10 gallons home nearly every night for his wife to bathe in,” Wagner added.

Wagner also noted the carbonate calcium alone was over 20 grains (350ppm) and his flow rates reached as high as 60 GPM. He is now changing the media and anodes on his six filter tanks at a cost after four years of around $4,000.

The Wagner system features six Pentair 2850 1-1/2” water valves that communicate with the ECOsmarte control boxes and have performed without issue for nearly five years. It should be noted that the Minnesota growing season runs from May through September and that Pentair recommends valve rebuilds every three years for growers operating in more temperate climates.

ECOsmarte points to the other side of the Minneapolis, MN market, Apple Valley, to the growing operation of Pahl’s Nursery which has treated all of its growing water since early 2000.

Gary Pahl, President, also points out his second “hex” (six tank 60 GPM) ECOsmarte system has six seasons of firm irrigation operation without a maintenance event or filter/valve update.

“We knew when we purchased our second ECOsmarte irrigation system for our expanded operation in 2003 this was both the fiscally and environmentally responsible approach to premium water,” Pahl emphasized.

Seed germination studies have confirmed quicker and higher rates with oxygenated and ionized water according to ECOsmarte.