“Water, Water, Everywhere, And Not A Drop To Drink” Ancient Mariner – Samuel Taylor Coleridge

So what do you do when you are near parched to death and you are surrounded by water, but it is all contaminated? Simple! You make your own charcoal water bottle filter.

Pastor Kurt Dahlin is the founder and director of Water Wells for Africa which serves about 260,000 people a day. For the past 22 years Pastor Kurt has been traveling to Malawi to coordinate water well drilling as a front line effort to improve the quality of life among remote communities who suffer with little or bad water conditions. His interest in water and sanitation led him to activated charcoal and its myriad of applications in water purification. Activated charcoal is not readily available in most Africa even though much of the raw product for activated charcoal is supplied from certain African countries. “Would the plain raw charcoal work in place of activated charcoal?” he wondered. And if it would, what could be devised as a temporary solution for contaminated water, while longer term solutions are being developed? His answer, the TRUSTED Water Bottle Filter.

Pastor Kurt writes, “I successfully combined the charcoal water filter with the SODIS (Solar water disinfection) to sanitize the dirtiest water. The entire process was thoroughly tested by Test America in Irvine, California. The raw water and the charcoal filtered water had E. coli presence. Yet the solarized water had no E. coli. I had the video created to take with me to Africa and teach in the villages. My awareness of the many benefits of charcoal and ash continues to grow and amaze me.”

While this innovation was first developed to serve developing countries, it is not hard to picture how well it could work after calamities strike. Tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes, landslides, often leave people cut off from basic needs such as pure water when they are surrounded by a sea of polluted contaminated water. With little effort the survivors can fashion these water bottles from the debris left behind and in a short time have safe drinking water. God provides hope even in His judgments.

 

Pastor Kurt has developed several simple practical health charts on sanitation and disease prevention and was happy for us to post them on our site. From water purification with charcoal, he has now become fascinated with the potential of charcoal as a medicinal. He has developed a simple protocol for cholera and dysentery, and recently emailed, “I have some video and pictures of me drinking charcoal slurry. We had a charcoal drinking party in one village last year. They were so happy to have  some hope. They said, “God sent you. We thought we had nothing,” Pressing ON. I plan to teach village leaders in about 10 areas.” Once he sees the charcoal work so effectively for diarrhea and wound infections, I am confident he will also want to spread the news that charcoal can PREVENT cerebral malaria, and help in the treatment of other devastating diseases.

Here is another simple innovative way to improve sanitation – the Tippy Tap

We will post more posters as they become available.

Thank you Pastor Kurt. God speed in your ministry.

Pastor Kurt has recently published a very practical 60-page booklet for missionaries on simple hygiene practices using charcoal. The book is titled Homemade Hygiene.

Given the calamities even in developed nations, it offers some simple ideas for minimizing contamination of water and purifying water with simple charcoal.

Pastor Kurt shares some more of his PERSONAL EXPERIENCES