Water Challenge Details

Challenge #1

Due to lack of low cost, sustainable, disruptive water management solutions, more than 70% of sewage in India is discharged untreated, polluting rivers, coastal areas and wells pouting three-fourths of the country’s water bodies. Ingenious ways of treating waste water is fast emerging as the key solution for meeting the ever-increasing demands of water consumption and conservation.  

It is estimated that India's total water and wastewater treatment market alone is worth about $420m, growing annually by about 18%. Today, Lack of treatment options lead to two problems: not treating wastewater (ie sewage) before discharging it into waterways pollutes the source, often rendering the water unusable for drinking. Secondly, the water intended for drinking is withdrawn from this same source, and again not adequately treated, creating significant public health problems.   

This problem is compounded by the fact that very little water, after the 'first use' (grey water) is recycled and goes mostly into sewage. 

The India-Israel Bridge is seeking innovative, low energy, cost effective sustainable solution for waste water treatment/desalination/recycling or purifying large scale water sources and surface water.  These solutions should be targeting B2B (business to business) and B2G (business to government) framework and their model must be affordable for servicing low income populations while conforming to quality standards.  

Challenge #2

In an unprecedented move, the government of India has committed to providing every person living in rural India safe and adequate drinking water. That means enough water to drink, cook, bathe and water livestock that is safe for these purposes. By its guidelines, this is quantified at 70 litres per capita per day (lpcd) by 2022.  Although India has made improvements over the past decades to both the availability and quality of drinking water systems, its large population has stressed planned water resources and rural areas are left out. India lacks overall long-term availability of replenishable water resources with many water sources being contaminated and over-exploited. 

India's demands for water is expected to increase as the population grows to 1.6 billion by year 2050. As to date, over 21% of India’s diseases are water-related, 1 in 5 children in India die before the age of 5 as a result of contaminated water, lack of sanitation, or inadequate hygiene. Almost 2 in 3 people who lack access to safe drinking water survive on less than $2 a day.  

The India Israel Bridge is looking for Innovative, affordable, effective sustainable solution that produces potable drinking water at point of use in both rural and urban areas. Target price point under USD 1 cent per liter. This can be done on individual, family or village scale. Solution should consider constraints obtaining to weather (wet areas with misplacement of water vs. drought), infrastructure, connectivity, ease of use etc.