Water Filtration Story: Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria

May 15, 2018
Rich Gellert

ACT I: No Clean Water

Puerto Rico’s water has been on our minds a lot and for a good reason. As the 2018 hurricane season is about to ramp up, the island is still recovering from the aftereffects of Maria, one of the worst disasters in Puerto Rico’s recorded history. Even today, there are entire communities still without power or fresh water. While some consider the government’s response to Maria as inconsistent and coming up short, it’s been nothing short of amazing how many individuals and companies stepped in to do what they can to help. Some incredible examples include Operation Agua, LifeStraw and WaterStep, all raising money to provide clean water.

When hurricane Maria hit, several months ago over half of the island was left without access to drinkable water. A week later that number barely dropped and even after months following the devastation, 35% of Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million citizens still did not have a source of clean drinking water. The logistics are daunting: Shipping as much water as needed would be next to impossible, and mass scale desalination, while currently under serious consideration, will take years to implement. The only way to make the impossible happen is to filter and re-use whatever water is readily available.

ACT II: Water Filtration

Kelly Hassberger and Charlie Peterson, owners of the juice and healthy food bar Degree 18 in Puerto Rico immediately understood what needed to be done and contacted us with a great idea: If HydroLogic could donate the equipment to create fresh water, they would install it, maintain it and make 1000 gallons a day available to the public at no cost. We knew the perfect system for the job, our best-selling workhorse of all time, the Evolution-RO™.

Using rain, river and municipal source water, Kelly and Charlie were able to install the Evolution, set up holding tanks and supply the needed power to deliver as promised. They are currently still serving as many people a day as possible and have plans to expand their clean water operations to many different parts of the island. Sometimes, it takes a community to do make things happen, and HydroLogic is proud to have played a key role in this fantastic humanitarian effort.

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