“Global Challenge, Global Solutions” is a series hosted on Climasphere highlighting inspiring, innovative, and creative global solutions to the challenge of climate change in the lead up to the next major climate conference, COP22. These solutions have been provided by members of the Earth To Marrakech coalition, a group of more than 50 media organizations, civil society groups, and businesses from around the world who are raising their voices in a collective call to move from words to action on climate change. Let’s send a message, from Earth To Marrakech: The solutions to climate change are out there, and they’re inspiring. 

Clean Water through Solar- Powered ATMs

Through its wa­ter-dis­pens­ing ATMs, Piramal Sar­javal delivers clean drinking water to more than 300,000 people every day across 12 In­dian states. Cus­tom­ers pur­chase the wa­ter with pay-as-you-go smart cards, and as the wa­ter-dis­pens­ing ATMs are solar powered and cloud con­nec­ted, the com­pany is able to re­motely track wa­ter qual­ity and trans­ac­tions.

Along­side their 180 wa­ter-dis­pens­ing ATMs, the com­pany builds and man­ages more than 390 wa­ter puri­fic­a­tion units. Piramal Sar­javal op­er­ates un­der a fran­chise-based busi­ness model, mean­ing all ATMs and purification units are operated by local community members em­ployed un­der the sys­tem. Wa­ter is priced af­ford­ably, at a frac­tion of the cost of bottled wa­ter, and the sys­tem’s ease and struc­ture makes ac­cess­ing safe wa­ter hassle-free.

RELEVANCE OF SOLUTION
Sev­enty-six mil­lion In­di­ans do not have ac­cess to clean wa­ter, a ma­jor con­trib­ut­ing factor to the 140,000 child deaths each year from diarrheal dis­eases.1 By mak­ing safe, clean wa­ter more ac­cess­ible and af­ford­able, Piramal Sar­javal’s wa­ter-dis­pens­ing ATMs provide a cru­cial ser­vice to un­der­served pop­u­la­tions throughout In­dia.

TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE

ENVIRONMENTAL
By treat­ing and puri­fy­ing wa­ter, Piramal Sar­javal pre­vents more un­safe and pol­luted wa­ter from en­ter­ing the en­vir­on­ment.

SOCIAL
Ac­cord­ing to the com­pany, rural In­dian wo­men spend 700 hours each year col­lect­ing wa­ter. Bring­ing clean wa­ter to their com­munit­ies frees up valu­able time for other activ­it­ies.

ECONOMIC
Piramal Sar­javal gen­er­ates about $4 mil­lion of eco­nomic activ­ity in the local com­munit­ies in which it op­er­ates, ac­cord­ing to the com­pany.