ILOILO CITY, Philippines--Flood-hit communities still have no drinking water one month after typhoon "Frank" (international code name: Fengshen) devastated Iloilo.
"Most of our water sources were contaminated during the inundation," said Guillermo Hisancha, vice mayor of Pavia, about nine kilometers west of the capital city, which was gravely hit by the calamity.
The June 22 flood contaminated almost all of municipalities' water sources—from shallow wells, deep wells and even the facilities of the Metro Iloilo Water District.
Water for drinking in badly hit areas is currently sourced from treatment facilities on loan from other government agencies and private organizations. But the water these facilities provide is not enough to meet the needs of the townsfolk.
In Pavia, for example, 40 percent of the town's households still have no access to potable water and some residents in interior villages have to go to the town proper to get drinking water or buy bottled water, according to Hisancha.
However, potable water may soon be available in water-starved communities in Iloilo, particularly in flood-stricken towns. A water purifier has been developed by the Industrial Technology Development Institute (ITDI), one of the research and development institutes of the Department of Science and Technology.
Rowen Gellonga, DOST regional director in Western Visayas, said the purifier would be "simple" and "easy to install" as it was mainly a water filter system that would need valves, pipes and water containers to strain the contaminants.
Gellonga said an initial test on the process produced 13 liters of potable water in one hour.
A prototype of the water purifying system was shipped to Iloilo and assembled by the regional DOST office on Friday.
"We are still trying some improvements in its capacity," he told the Philippine Daily Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net).
Once tests are completed, the system will be demonstrated before Iloilo mayors and other local officials to convince them to install the system in their towns.
The system would work by first ensuring that the evident impurities have settled first before the water is strained for purification, according to Gellonga.
The "clear" water is then loaded to the first container, which acts as the settling basin of the water filter system.
"It must settle in the container for about 30 minutes before you open the valve to drain the water going to the next containers," Gellonga said.
The succeeding filters would sieve the remaining particles with the water running through layers of pebbles and activated carbon.
"The contaminants would stick to the surface of the activated carbon. It would further remove any unpleasant smell from the water," he explained. The activated carbon could be made available by ITDI, he added.
Passing to the fourth container, which would be equipped with a stirring rod, an allowable level of chlorine is mixed. "This will further clear the water from impurities," Gellonga said.
The final stage will have the water go through ceramic filtration.
"The ceramic filter traps further residuals to have the finished product," he said.
Gellonga said his office has been conducting microbial analysis on the finished product of the facility "to ensure it could eliminate fecal coliform and other impurities mixed in water."
Gellonga said the water purification facility would be "ideal in clustered houses."
"Local government units could fabricate this facility in their communities. We are still analyzing if we can come up with a simpler system that could integrate all the filters," he added.
He said the improvements must be "economical, user-friendly and easy to assemble."
He said installing the facility would cost from P5,000 to P10,000, which could be subsidized by the local governments concerned. In fabricating the system, only the activated carbon and the ceramic filter would be supplied, he added.
Gellonga said the ITDI planned to present this type of water purifier to local governments in typhoon-hit areas here this week.
