Innovation Design Engineering (MA/MSc)

Paul Mendieta

Paul is an entrepreneur at heart. Founder and CEO of Deploy Tech Ltd and co-founder and CEO of Project Stealth Tech Ltd (UK based start-ups). Former director of EónCorp technology and consultancy, and GeoPro Engineering and Design solutions (Ecuador based companies). He is trained as a Civil Engineer with 6 years of experience. In the early stages of his carrier, he took part in the construction of infrastructure projects including sport Centres, bridges, coach stations, roads, water and sewer pipelines. His work for Ecuadorian public companies as Project Manager, Project Supervisor, and Design Engineer has contributed to the development of more than 70 infrastructure projects from 2014 to 2017, his responsibilities consisted on planning, designing, evaluating, managing, supervising, and Quality control. During 2017-2018 he was part of an elite team, where he collaborated as Support Analyst, the project was called “Master Plan for Cuenca, phase 3”. The team was recruited to forecast, plan and design the future of drinking water and sanitation infrastructure, including rural communities, needed by Azuay county, Ecuador, until the year 2050. In the Autumn term of 2018, he joined the Innovation Design Engineering master’s course. In 2020, he worked as a Graduate-Teaching-Assistant of the Human-Centred Design course at Dyson School of Design Engineering, Imperial College London. For his second year of the master’s programme, he was involved in two projects and both were successfully sponsored by InnovationRCA for patent support. Currently, he has filed two patents in the UK and incorporated two start-up companies.

Contact

ku.ca.acr.krowten@ateidnem.luap

https://paulmendieta.myportfolio.com/

Degree Details

School of Design

Innovation Design Engineering (MA/MSc)

In Collaboration with:

Beren Kayali

Graphic Design

Deploy is a project that aims to provide a community-led approach to water management. It helps rural communities that do not have access to clean water in developing countries by providing them with an affordable option and a product that adapts to their water storage needs. This project is infrastructure innovation with a price-focused strategy. All the properties and features come together to create a low-cost product for the end-user.

The water crisis is more relevant than ever since without access to safely managed drinking water, millions of people living in vulnerable areas are at risk of infectious diseases like COVID-19.

By interacting with more than 175 communities in Ecuador and analysing their water-related infrastructure, I found that water storage is an essential component for any water supply system. At the same time, it is the most expensive feature of the system due to its magnitude. I leveraged my relationship with an extraordinary UK company called Concrete Canvas Ltd to develop a water storage unit that could address some of the main issues seen in the field. Concrete Canvas manufactures a material called Geosynthetic Cementitious Composite Mats (GCCMs), which means concrete-filled fabric. For this project, I have been using Concrete Canvas Hydro (CC HydroTM) that incorporates a geomembrane as part of the composite that provides impermeability properties to the material, making it perfect for water storage.

I have explored manufacturing processes, structural reinforcement, geometry, size and form to create a water tank that is best adapted to the parameters required. I have created a product that can be folded, packed and transported easily. Once it arrives at the site it can be simply deployed by one person and it can reach a volume of 40 000 litres. When hydrated, Deploy transforms into a unified concrete shell that ensures the durability, resistance, and reliability of the water storage vessel.

Deploy is ready to be used in just 24 hours. Its modularity and transportability help users to develop the best strategy for the usage and location of their water-related infrastructure to maximize efficiency and convenience for almost any application. As well as water storage, distribution, potable water treatment, sewer water containment, and even other liquids like beer and wine, could be held within the Deploy tank, without requiring any technical help or construction contractors.

Product overview

By providing an affordable new solution for water storage, as well as, empowering communities with their water-related infrastructure, access to safely managed drinking water will increase and can easily be maintained over time transforming the lives of rural communities in developing countries around the world.

Base — The material is cut and assembled in the correct position.

Wall — The pieces are joined together with thermal bonding equipment.

Settings — During this process, connections for the reinforcement have to be installed, as well as, water accessories and air fittings.

Final manufacturing process — All components together.

Folding

Packaging

Easy to transport

Inside view deployment — At the moment of deployment, the inflation system is connected, and Deploy starts to conform to the expected shape.

Hydration — Once inflated, the tank is sprayed with water to hydrate the Concrete Canvas Hydro™.

Ready to use — In just 24 hours the tank will be ready to use. Each tank has been designed to supply a community of up to 500 people with clean water.

Worldwide considerations — The realities of rural communities around the world are different and Deploy has considered all these circumstances to implement its technology accordingly. On top of that, Deploy saves up to 91% of CO2 for transportation, and 73.4% for materials, in comparison with conventional concrete solutions. Making it the best option for the environment.

Service Proposal — Deploy has planned to create partnerships with local tank distribution companies to provide an installation service of the product. The distributors would deliver the tank to the communities. Usually, there are two possibilities a) there is direct access to the site or b) conventional vehicles like pick-up trucks or smalls trucks can only reach the community surroundings and not the location where the tank is required. For case b, the community would be in charge of transporting the tank as well as the equipment for the deployment, i.e a backhoe can be hired. Then, the distributors would be responsible to deploy and hydrate the tank, as well as, installing the reinforcement and leaving the product ready to be used within 24 hours.

Usage of Deploy — When Deploy is suitable to be used and the pipelines are connected, water can start being consumed by households, schools, health centres, and the different communal facilities. A water storage unit enables the pipelines to carry the resource to the users, similar to how the heart distributes the blood flow to different parts of the body. This vessel allows a controlled distribution of the resource, by creating access to safely managed water for communities. Then, this water flow will reach the hands of little children and the elderly, preventing them from catching infectious diseases such as cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and COVID-19.

In developing countries the necessity for water-related infrastructure is massive. For example, the Ecuadorian water storage market size has been evaluated and reaches £123 million pounds and it’s growing every year. The growth of this market is driven by the increment of awareness from governments in the provision of safely managed drinking water to vulnerable populations to improve health conditions and guarantee their wellbeing.

InnovationRCA

Website:

https://www.rca.ac.uk/research-innovation/innovationrca/

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Deploy – Water storage solution for vulnerable communities