watercone[edit source]

I'm in Burundi and while attending a BioSand Filter training a question was posed about removing salinity from the water. So far as I knew the best way to deal with salinity is to distill it, so I did a bit of googling and found this. I have to admit that for a Burundian living upcountry where 40,000 Burundian Francs (FBU) which is currently about 33 USD and can be the annual amount transacted, (not including subsistence farming etc) the notion that a watercone at about 30,000 FBU is nearly ludicrous. That all assuming you can get it in country at that price with bribes and the problems importing into east africa, or the notion that you can get burundian's to buy into a muzungu device, or that the children won't break it, etc.

Admittedly there is the caveat about cost and how it's not effective for the developing work, but I guess what I'm asking is if it's not an appropriate product for the developing world is it appropriate to place it in the appropedia.

I like the Technology, but I'm trying to develop ideas on how to implement them here. Wonderfullyrich 12:05, 5 June 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

-- This is a good point - and cost must be considered for any AT -- but I don't know that tech should be eliminated from appropedia simply because of the cost of its retail product. Having access to the basics of the watercone design may allow others to find more economical ways to make it, improve it, or develop a home brew version -- Joshua 13:13, 5 June 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I agree with Joshua. Sometimes the ideas shared on Appropedia will more valuable as ideas than as practical projects.
Yes, when prices for a simple technology are so high, it's wise to look at more affordable options, and this is a common problem in aid projects. It will be wonderful when Appropedia can have some more tools to help compare technologies by total cost (e.g. semantic features, so that all technologies with a "first year cost" and "ongoing cost" can be compared and sorted by these values). --Chriswaterguy 04:25, 6 June 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
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