Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

The Program of Water Recycling and Purifying for Sustainability

Total Budget: $3,885,453.15
1 January 2016 to 14 February 2018
Xuanyi Chen
OSU College of Business, Department of Finance
Nawei Jiang
OSU College of Business, Department of Accounting
Rachel Wang
OSU College of Business, Department of Finance
Shengchen Wu
OSU College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Mathematics

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

Executive Summary
The main goal for our project is to build a water purification system around campus. When we walk
around campus during winter or spring.
Sometimes we have this sense of feeling that the snow and rain falling from the sky are wasted.
According to what we know, in some countries, which located in areas where water resource is very
deficient, people actually tend to find ways to accumulate snow or rain and try to recycle is and reuse it.
Therefore, to accumulate snow and rain on campus and put them through a Water Purification System so
that students on campus can reutilize it for free is the desirable result that we look forward to getting from
this specific project. In such a way, we are saving water in a form of recycling and purifying, and we also
offer free clean water for the students and their ideology towards water saving would be strengthened.
To accomplish this goal, first we need to conduct a survey to ask for peoples opinion about it. We do not
wish that what we are going to do will against peoples will. Then we decide what kind of machine to
produce so that we could try the best to save energy and space. We also have to figure out the place to
install the machine since it is very crucial for this project. Additionally, we have to carefully select
manufacture and construction suppliers so that we can make sure that they are professional enough to
minimize the mistakes that will incur. Finally after the installation, we will have a probation period to
testify the actual usefulness and efficiency of our project, and also to see if anywhere would need a
change or correction. During and after the probation period, we will evaluate the project as a whole and
will possibly do a survey again to ask people for feedbacks.
If this project could be successfully taken place even only in one single university, it will have an
influential result on the overall perspective towards water recycling and reusing in daily lives. From our
ordinary knowledge, we only know that shortening shower time, making sure that water taps are tightly
closed when they are not used and things like these can help us protect and save water resource. However,
after this project, people will have the knowledge of reusing water and actually participate in the process
of water recycling.
Water resource on earth is limited, and nearly 80%of the water resource is not usable. They are either
persisting in solid form, such as the icebergs in the South Pole, or they are salty ocean water, which is
very difficult for utilization. This project will not only benefits our students here at the Ohio State
University, but also the whole population of the human being and the earth if it gets developed further in
the future.
Again, we remain absolutely optimistic and positive towards our project since it can reconcile a very
realistic and serious problem that everyone loves on earth would have to deal with someday. We are
pushing it forward so that we can cope with it in advance and be prepared for it. Also it is an unprofitable
program intending to benefit the society as a whole so that our citizens would easily support it. And this
project is not to make a profit out of our students or anything. It would be using the funding to provide the
machine and purification system without any charge. In this way, college students who generally are not
fully able to make a living on their own would be more likely to support it and spread it.

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

Background
Water is an important resource in our life. Our daily life cannot work smoothly without water. Water
plays a crucial role in nature, agriculture and human economic activities. However, water scarcity is
another severe problem. There are following reasons that may cause water scarcity. First of all, water
pollution is an important cause due to the industrial construction and human activities. Then, the increase
of human population let water demand rise rapidly too. Moreover, area variation is also significant. Some
area lacks rainfall thus lacks fresh water resources because they dont locate in coastal regions or not
tropical zones. Those areas normally have difficulties approaching to plenty of fresh water. Ohio is such a
place.
Our project zoom in the problem and targets on Ohio State University. What we are going to work with
the water-recycling problem is to provide students with fresh water by purifying snow. As the capital of
the State of Ohio, Columbus is an inland city with latitude of 40 degrees. So water is not plentiful.
However, Columbus is famous for its great snowfall. Chart 1 shows the days with snowing and the
amount in different months. From the
Days
Inches
Centimeters
chart we can see that more than half a
year in Columbus there would be snow.
9.2
January
9.5
24.1
Since Columbus is abundant in snowfall,
we propose to make use of the heavy
6.7
February
6.3
16.0
snow to benefit OSU students. The
Columbus campus of Ohio State
4.7
March
4.4
11.2
University occupies an area of 1,765
acres which is quite large. During
1.2
April
1.1
2.8
winter, students walk outdoors against
the cold weather to class. So we plan to
0.1
October
0.2
0.5
set 20 to 40 water purification stations
outdoors which are able to take in snow
1.8
November
0.9
2.3
and transfer it to fresh water. This action
allows students to get fresh hot water
6.7
December
5.1
13.0
during their walk to class. The locations
of these water purification stations
30.4
Year
27.5
69.9
mainly are set on the oval, because oval
is a big open grassland where plenty of
students have to walk across it to get to
Figure 1. Average total snowfall and days with fresh snow in
class buildings. Also we will set other
Columbus 1981-2010
stations near bus stops and libraries.
Our team is supported by Ohio State University to make researches among students and collect funding.
Moreover, this proposal applies to the concept of sustainability and has a long-term effect on
sustainability development.

Description of the Problem

Our project considers the climate in Columbus which has a long period of snowing yearly. Combining the
considerations of the heavy snowfall with students demand on drinking hot water during winter, our team
come forward this proposal.

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

Since Columbus has a great amount of snowfall which is barely utilized, we plan to collect the snow
during winter and provide students with fresh hot water by setting up water purification systems. The
water purification stations are mainly set on oval which has a high volume of students crossing daily.
When in winter, the wind blows strongly and snowfall is heavy. Although in teaching buildings there are
many water fountains but when at outdoors, students are unable to obtain hot water. What is more,
students have to walk across the big oval to get to class. So our objective is to let students get some hot
water in cold days.
As for the setup of the water purifications stations, we intend to do a research among OSU students about
at which places do they want most to have the hot water. After the research we will come out the desired
locations where the water purification stations should be set up.

Proposal or Needs Statement with Thesis

We plan to provide OSU students with fresh hot water by setting up water purification stations on campus
which can transfer and purify snow and rain to fresh water. In the long term, we plan to achieve the water
recycling in the campus.

Description of Solution
Many countries are suffering from scarcity of water. In other words, a lot of people cannot drink clean
water. There are two main reasons. The first is that those countries do not plentiful water resource, like
other countries do. The second is that those countries are unable to use indirect natural water resources,
like rain.
Our project is collecting rain and snow to convert to drinking water in the Ohio State University. We
decide to produce a machine that can convert snow and rain into drinking water. During winter, when
snow stacks on ground, students can directly put snow into the machine. The machine will convert snow
into hot water and cold water. Students can choose which kind of water they want. During raining days,
the machine will collect rain directly, and store rain in the machine. When students want to drink, the
machine will purify rain water into drinking water.
Some people may think that water purification is a complex progress, and they may question of our
project can achieve the water purification. However, Chittaranjan Ray and other authors come up easy
ways to achieve water purification in the book named Low Cost Emergency Water Purification
Technologies. In other words, we are able to ensure that water from the machine in our project is clean
and healthy.
We decide to make the machine into a white cylinder which is easy to distinguish. Moreover, white color
will not absorb too much sunlight. Too much sunlight can cause rise in temperature of water inside the
machine. In other words, this situation can increase the cost of producing cold water. Cylinder has round
surface which can protect students. A lot of students use bicycles and skates as transportation vehicles in
the campus. Sometimes, students might lose control of bicycles and skates by accident. If students hit the
cylinder machine, they will not get hurt.

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

We decide to open
a big hole which is
controlled by a
button at the top of
the machine. There
is a container
which is connected
to the hole. When
students press the
button, the hole
will open. Then,
students can put
snow into the
container through
the hole. On the
two sides of the
container, we insert
one heater on each
side. The heater
can
convert snow
Figure 2: Machine Design
into water. At the
bottom of container, we will place a filter which can take out some water-insoluble materials, like stones
and grass. Moreover, we will put a purifier behind the filter. The purifier contains several chemical
materials which can take out water-soluble impurities. All in all, these two layers can clean water into
drinking water. After purification, we install two steel pipes which can separate water into two flows. The
left pipe is for hot water, and another one is for cold water. We will set up a heater on the left pipe and s
cooler on the right pipe. When students press the button of hot water, the heater on the left pipe will start
to work to produce hot water. When students press the button of cold water, the cooler will work to make
cold water through the right pipe. We also plan to make several small holes near the big hole. During
raining day, the container can collect rain through small holes. The machine will work by the same
principle.
As a result, snow and rain can be used directly. In other words, water is recycled. People can save water
in daily lives.

Methods of Approach:
Our goal is to provide drinkable water for OSU students with a convenient approach. We plan to establish
many water purification stations around campus, especially in Union, where accommodates a large
amount of students every day. In order to implement our plan, we need to solve a list of problems first,
such as where to install the water purification stations, the method of how to install the system and so on.

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

At the beginning of our research, we conduct a survey to test if this project is necessary for the OSU
students. This survey is mainly to evaluate the situation of students water drinking every day, like how
many bottles of water they need, what kinds of water they like (bottled, boiled, cold, and so on), do
students encounter thirsty when they walk in the street. According to this survey, our group can find the
perfect places and estimate the appropriate number of water purification stations should be installed
around campus.

Figure 3: Places of water purification stations

Right after the

survey, our group plans
to hire a research team
to help solve some
technical problems.
This research team will
figure out the feasible
method of installation
and give advice to
improve our water
purification stations.
After the field trips, the
research team will
have a better
overview of our

university situation and provide the best opinions.

In June 2016, we start to work on the machines that will be install on campus. Selecting manufacturing
supplier is an important step to begin because a bad supplier may lead to our failure of project. We plan to
search online and walk into the stores of top rated suppliers. Comparing different suppliers, our group
tries to find the best supplier that meets our requirements. After deciding the supplier, we are going to
manufacturing the machine under the instruction of the research team.
After about one year preparation, our group plans to install the machine on campus in 2017. We decide to
choose the construction crew that cooperates with the university before because they have the experience
of working at the school and reduce the probability of disturbing the students. The actual installation
period is about eight months, and the next six months are probation period. Research team will check the
problems, and maintenance teams will fix them immediately.
At the ending period of our project, we will hand out the fliers to introduce the usage of water purification
stations. Some students might be unfamiliar about that machine, which is easy to learn how to use it. We
try to get the stations widely used in OSU campus through our propaganda.

Benefits and Feasibility of the Project

The Ohio State University has lots of students who come from other countries. Different people in
different countries have different diets, for instance, most of Chinese and Korean prefer to drink hot water
in the winter. Nina Simonds stated it in her article named A spoonful of ginger: irresistible, health-giving
recipes from Asian kitchens. As a result, our project can solve this problem. Moreover, students always
are suffering from the low temperature in the winter. This machine will produce hot water which can help

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

students to warm their hands. As a result, we believe that students satisfactions of the university will
increase.
There are lots of areas which do not have buildings in the Ohio State University, for example, the Oval.
We plan to build machines on the Oval, because students cannot find water machines when they are
walking in the Oval. Moreover, the Oval is a quite big place. In other words, there are lots of snows on
the Oval in winter. As a result, during the winter, students can get unlimited amount of hot water.

Your Qualifications
Our group members are Xuanyi Chen, Shengchen Wu, Rachel Wang and Nawei Jiang.
Xuanyi Chen and Rachel Wang are students who take finance as their majors. As a result, they can check
the financial situation of our project, and provide some suggestion about how to decrease our budget. In
other words, our project will not have problem of over budgeting. When we do the data audit, we can
figure out every cost and benefit.
Nawei Jiang is a student who has experience in working of marketing. In other words, she is able to
collect information about students opinions about the project, and come up several ways to improve our
project by analyzing students opinion. Moreover, as a marketing student, she can determine where
posters should be stuck, in order to increase awareness of our project.
Shengchen Wu is a student who takes mathematics as his major. He also takes several classes about
chemistry and physics in the freshmen year. Moreover, he has some friends whose major are chemistry.
As a result, he is able to point out the principle of the machine. Moreover, he can explain details of
running the project to other group members. As a student whose major is mathematics, he can calculate if
the electricity cost equals to value of amount of water saved by machines.

Conclusion
To conclude what mentioned before, the main theme of our proposal is to build a water purification
system around campus. The reason why we first started this idea is the fact that water resource on earth is
limited, and nearly 80%of the water resource is not usable. They are either persisting in solid form, such
as the icebergs in the South Pole, or they are salty ocean water, which is very difficult for utilization.
Along with the involvement of modern technology, water wasting and water polluting become more and
more severe. It is very likely that when someone is taking a 40 minutes long shower in a shower tub,
some people in Africa are dying from lack of water. Water resource is valuable and it is not going to
reoccur once it is used up. Therefore, it is very significant and crucial for people to realize how precious
water is and how to actually save water in our daily lives. These are basically the background that first
triggered us for this proposal.
Relatively in the meantime, the problem is when we walk around campus during winter or spring; we
have this sense of feeling that the snow and rain falling from the sky are wasted. According to what we
know, in some countries, which located in areas where water resource is very deficient, people actually
tend to find ways to accumulate snow or rain and try to recycle is and reuse it. When we link this fact to
the problem that discussed above, we came up with our thesis: to accumulate snow and rain on campus
and put them through a water purification system so that students on campus can reutilize it for free. In

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

such a way, we are saving water in a form of recycling and purifying, and we also offer free clean water
for the students and their ideology towards water saving would be strengthened.
Furthermore, what we need for our proposal is pretty simple. First we need to conduct a survey to ask for
peoples opinion about it. We do not wish that what we do would against peoples will. Then we decide
what kind of machine to produce so that we could try the best to save energy and space. We also have to
figure out the place to install the machine since it is very crucial for this project. Additionally, we have to
carefully select manufacture and construction suppliers so that we can make sure that they are
professional enough to minimize the mistakes that will incur. Finally after the installation, we will have a
probation period to testify the actual usefulness and efficiency of our project, and also to see if anywhere
would need a change or correction. During and after the probation period, we will evaluate the project as
a whole and will possibly do a survey again to ask people for feedbacks.
We have feasible and detail plans for the whole project that were came up with by our intelligent team
members. We did a lot research concerning the topic and are fully prepared for this project to take place.
We came up with the data and methods based on reality, such as the similar projects that happened before,
and we take the specialty of our project into consideration and made some relative changes so that it will
be more doable.
We intend and plan to fulfill this program within 3 years. It might also takes less depends on how fast we
can receive the funds. The detailed timeline for conduction of the project is included in this file (see
attachment). Again, we remain absolutely optimistic and positive towards our project since it can
reconcile a very realistic and serious problem that everyone loves on earth would have to deal with
someday. We are pushing it forward so that we can cope with it in advance and be prepared for it. Also it
is an unprofitable program intending to benefit the society as a whole so that it would be easily supported
by our citizens. The total cost is about 3885453.15 dollars.

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

Water Recycling and Purifying

Budget
Year
Construction Workers' wages
Janitors' wage
Posters Expenses
Equipments
Data Aduit
Total

2015
$75,000.00
$48,000.00
$17,600.00
$1,927,801.80
$30,000.00
$2,098,401.80

2016
$75,000.00
$48,000.00
$17,600.00
$963,900.90
$30,000.00
$1,134,500.90

2017
$75,000.00
$48,000.00
$17,600.00
$481,950.45
$30,000.00
$652,550.45

Assume the working hours equal to 4000 hours

Janitor's hour wage is 12 dollars
One equipment contains 2 heaters, 1 cooler, 1 filter and 1 purifier, several steel pipes
We plan to build 20 equipments

Total
$225,000.00
$144,000.00
$52,800.00
$3,373,653.15
$90,000.00
$3,885,453.15

Chen, Jiang, Wang & Wu

10

Water Recycling and Purifying

Program:
needed)
Situation:

Inputs

Water Purification

Activities
Participation

Logic Model

Outputs

Short
Long

Group members
Construction
crew
Time for
research

Decide the
method of how to
install the system

Group Members

Outcomes

Conduct a campus
survey to make sure
the appropriate
places of installation

Medium

Reduce water
waste for a long
development

Construction Crew

Time for
installation

Establish a feasible
plan for the
decisions

Funding
Water
purification
system

(uses text boxes: add/change boxes and arrows as

Decide how many

water purification
systems will be
built university

Decide where to
install the water
purification system

Get the water

purification system
widely used in OSU
campus

Install the water

purification system
on campus
Group Members

Raising the
awareness of water
conservation and
water recycling.

Contribute to an
economic benefit
due to water saving

Research Faculty
Decide different
size of the system
depends on the
specific place

Hand out the fliers to

introduce the usage
of water purification
system

Assumptions

External Factors

The school approves the installation of water purification system.

Weather, environment, student attitudes

Rev. 11/6

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Water Recycling and Purifying

Citation
Simonds, N. (1999). A spoonful of ginger: Irresistible, health-giving recipes from Asian kitchens. New
York: Alfred A. Knopf. Retrieved from http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/samples/random041/98075735.html
Ray, C., Jain, R., McCombs, K., Freeland, J., & Kumaraguruparan, P. (2014). Low cost emergency water
purification technologies. Waltham, Massachusetts; Oxford [England]: Butterworth-Heinemann.
Retrieved from http://osu.worldcat.org/title/low-cost-emergency-water-purificationtechnologies/oclc/878147635&referer=brief_results

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Water Recycling and Purifying