Project Details

During the Scientific Exploration Society's expedition to Bolivia in 2004, Colonel John Blashford-Snell OBE, the President of Just a Drop, discovered that the Vallegrande water supply system was damaged. He identified its restoration as a suitable community project and secured £5,100/ $10,000 in funding from Just a Drop. He passed the supervision of the project to Colonel Mike Reynolds, a chartered civil engineer with experience of water supply projects in Nepal.
The steel pipework was 35 years old and suffered from extensive rusting. Patch repairs would not solve the problem as a multitude of pinprick holes meant that as soon as some were repaired others would burst through. This resulted in water rationing and cuts in supply, which was a real problem in the hot summers.

2.5km of UPVC (plastic) pipe was used to replace the old pipework. It was laid in a trench 1m deep and 0.4m wide, which was dug mainly by hand by a team of 30 labourers, many of them father and son pairs. Work started on 24th May and was scheduled to last for four weeks. After a week's delay caused by bad weather, it was completed on 25th June 2004.

The 8,500 people of Vallegrande now have a 24-hour supply of safe, clean water at a cost to Just a Drop of just $1.20 per person.