Yan Wang
Case Western Reserve University - Weatherhead School of Management
Chris Laszlo
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PackH2O is designed to help solve the issue of lack of drinking water for people living in water stressed communities or in regions of disasters. Water, a basic need for human beings, can also be a medium to spread waterborne diseases and to impact health. By providing clean water to stressed communities, 210,000 PackH2Os have benefited more than 105,000 lives in 35 countries across the world.
The backpack has a wide mouth which allows it to be filled quickly, helping minimize waiting time. It is also designed to have safe tapered slides to ensure the water will not leak. The water backpack is light in weight and is ergonomic. Although it can hold up to 20 liters of water, people who carry it and walk with it for long distances will not feel as tired as when carrying other containers. Since it has very comfortable padding and adjustable slide buckles, it allows the user to adjust it for the best fit for their body size. It is also designed to integrate a flat football-shaped bottom allowing it to stand up by itself. The front of the backpack has a spout for dispensing water which reduces the risk of secondary water pollution. It is made out of a special material called industrial-grade woven polypropylene. It is waterproof, collapsible, extremely durable, and rip-resistant.
Since the product will be sold to remote areas where there is no transportation infrastructure, the company will distribute them by plane without concerns of them breaking. The backpack also has an inner liner that can be removed and sanitized in sunlight. This health benefit cannot be achieved when water is carried in cans or buckets. Research has shown that sanitizing the liner of the backpack in the sun has the same effectiveness as chlorination. The backpack serves both residential and commercial needs and is less expensive to transport to the ground in remote areas than the rigid containers currently used. Just one backpack can provide safe water for a classroom of children for an entire day, or serve the water needs for a household of five.
In Haiti, after the 2010 earthquake, people living there had very poor water conditions. People carried water by using cans and buckets. Not only in disaster zones, but also in some water stressed regions there are still many people who are struggling with basic survival due to poor water provision. Inspired by this challenge, the company gathered their talented professional team, and worked in collaboration with Greif Inc, to create and test PackH2O. The company worked with NGOs to consult with women in Haiti who were testing the water backpack, and with the Clinton Global Initiative and Habitat of Humanity International - until the best possible product was ready for distribution.
“Because our intention is to serve the water needs for a household of five, we want to make our product more practical and also cost-saving, compared to other alternatives in this area. We have three designers and some engineers in our team. At the beginning, we came up with more than 100 plans for the backpack, but through serious consideration and research, finally we decided to choose the current one, which is the most user-friendly and economical water backpack," said Danwei Ye, a designer for Nottingham Spirk.
Nowadays, although our society has experienced rapid economic growth and improvements in the quality of living, drinking water is still a serious problem. Our world has some areas where 700 million people have no access to clean water and need to walk a long distance to get their daily supply. They carry their water in plastic barrels on their head and then pour the contents into their water tanks for storage. This poses great risks of secondary pollution. Contaminated water spreads diseases and produces great health complications. PackH2O is a health-focused solution that promotes safe water transportation and storage. Through use of this water backpack, water-stressed communities have a tool to improve health and so it positively impacts lives.
The PackH2O water backpack has won five worldwide awards: Sustainable Plastic Packaging Award in 2014, Cooper Hewitt People’s Design Award in 2013, Honorable Mention for Excellence in Public Interest Design Award in 2013, Best of What’s New Award in 2012, and Industrial Design Award in 2012. Compared to similar products in the industry, PackH2O is cost-saving and time-saving to produce because it adopts simple innovations and a special material. Because it is user-friendly, has a low price, and most importantly, is less-expensive to place in the field than the rigid containers currently used, it rapidly gained popularity in 35 countries around the world. Now it is a globally recognized product that has shifted the paradigm of water transportation and storage. Moreover, PackH2O is a patented product sold within several nations and provides good business opportunities for small, local entrepreneurs to distribute or assemble the products, creating new jobs there.
Transporting drinking water is a serious problem for more than 2 billion people who lack water in their homes, and as many as 700 million people need to walk long distances for their water on a daily basis. At the same time, water-related diseases are responsible for 80 percent of all illnesses & deaths in the developing world. The purposeful PackH2O water backpack promotes improved health and is a solution to ensure “safe water in” and “safe water out”. Like the mosquito net which when used properly restricts the spread of malaria, the PackH2O is a disease prevention tool that assists in ensuring waterborne illnesses are severely reduced for the millions living in water stressed environments around the world. The PackH2O Water Backpack is an award winner and is now famous in the world. To this date, packH2O has been adopted by more than 50 NGOs in 35 countries. About 210,000 PackH2Os have been deployed, and by using the PackH2O, 105,000 people's lives in water stressed communities have been positively impacted. About 25,000 PackH2Os were delivered to earthquake victims in Nepal by Habitat for Humanity.
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Danwei Ye, Designer
Nottingham Spirk, located in Cleveland, has done business innovation & product design for 45 years, developing hundreds of patented designs which were launched and have generated tens of billions in revenue.