Following the earthquake of January 12, 2010, two areas of importance for RAPID response are water and energy. Haiti is a country with abundant rainfall but inadequate water and sanitation systems, which now have been largely demolished by the earthquake. Furthermore, Haiti, even before the earthquake, had extremely low electric power production and distribution. To address these two key areas of need, two novel technologies will be deployed and tested. For water collection and treatment, a system has been designed for combined rainwater harvesting and treatment using porous clay ceramics. In addition to deploying and demonstrating this system in Jacmel, its effectiveness in terms of capacity, treatment rate, and resulting water quality will be tested. For renewable energy production, a novel 5 kW wind turbine designed specifically for deployment in a disaster relief scenario will be deployed, demonstrated, and tested. Additionally, a meteorological measurement station to characterize wind resources at the Jacmel location will be set up. Finally, fine resolution numerical atmospheric simulations will be conducted, using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model to map the wind resources and potential wind turbine placement sites around Port-au-Prince and other sites in Haiti. From the deployment of these two novel devices, there will be numerous "lessons learned" about the ease of deployment in a disaster, their efficiency of operation, and their effectiveness and reliability. These findings are anticipated to be translatable to other developing world locations. The disaster in Haiti presents a time sensitive opportunity to advance technologies for built better sustainable response and reconstruction in the developing world.

Bruce Hamilton Program Director Environmental Sustainability 3/26/10

Project Report

In this project we challenged conventional ideas about water and energy technologies for disaster recovery. For off-the-grid power generation, the norm is for electric power to be produced from diesel generators, which are environmentally damaging and uncomfortably loud. For water, the norm is for supplies to be delivered from remote locations, a costly endeavor in terms of energy. We sought to find environmentally sustainable solutions for portable energy and water technologies. In this project, we designed, fabricated and tested a portable wind-solar power generator called Power-in-a- BoxTM. The novel design is a hybrid electric power generator that consists of a wind turbine on a telescoping mast as well as solar panels. The entire system folds up into a standard twenty-foot cargo shipping container for easy transport. It can be deployed using only human power in less than one hour. It generates 2 to 3 kW of electricity, sufficient to power a small clinic or school. While the project scope did not allow for deployment in a disaster recovery scenario, a prototype system was successfully built and tested in 2012. This project also led to the design and fabrication of a portable rainwater harvester. The hood and cistern are designed to fit in a standard twenty-foot cargo shipping container. Upon deployment the hood unfolds from the cargo container and funnels water into the container cistern, which could serve 50 to 100 people. The design can accommodate the addition of a bank of porous ceramic water filters, which can be made sustainably from fired pots of clay and sawdust. The fabricated rainwater harvester has been donated to a not-for-profit organization that specializes in novel simple rainwater harvesting approaches and applications in the developing world. This project has inspired a whole chain of new research and teaching activities into novel adaptable structures that adjust in response to changes in wind and other environmental drivers. An example is the design of a novel "smart mast" that leverages the versatility of pantograph systems and advances in sensor, actuator and informatics technologies. The smart-mast is a three-tier tetrahedral mast that would lower itself in response to high wind loads. This project engaged a diverse and multidisciplinary team of researchers, and inspired the creative thinking of an array of students. Furthermore, broad news coverage of Princeton’s Power-in-a-BoxTM has resulted in far-reaching impacts and future collaborations.

Project Start
Project End
Budget Start
2010-05-01
Budget End
2013-04-30
Support Year
Fiscal Year
2010
Total Cost
$102,000
Indirect Cost
Name
Princeton University
Department
Type
DUNS #
City
Princeton
State
NJ
Country
United States
Zip Code
08544