‘Necessity is the mother of invention,’ was probably one of those English proverbs that we knew because we had to pass an English exam. But for this particular group of students, this has turned out to be more than just a saying because they have truly lived it out.
Wet Technik is a student-led start-up founded by a multidisciplinary group of students who identified the need to reduce the cost of recycling waste water and rather than complain, they went ahead to find a solution through their range of waste water recycling solutions.
Their goal is to set up a sustainable green business competition offering its clients solutions to waste water as well as optimizing water use in households and institutions through the use of their constructed wetland.
They say talk is cheap but these guys have gone ahead to prove that their ideas are much more than just mere words and one of the team members says, ‘One of our systems, a constructed wetland in which we used pumice, a novel material in this application, has proven to effectively recycle wastewater at our pilot plant at Africa Hall in Makerere University.’
They have also used horsetail reed, a plant which has good treatment properties and an aesthetic appeal as well making their systems fit within one’s backyard while providing valuable water that can be used in backyard gardening, toilet flushing and other non-potable applications of water. Talk of being multipurpose!
The team that is comprised of; Kwizera Pike, Ssekimpi Dennis, Musinguzi Mark, Buzabo Melissa, Nina Shatsi and Emmanuel Musumba, all final year students at Makerere University pursuing Civil and Mechanical engineering came together while in their 3rd year and won the Problem Based Learning competition held at the College of Engineering, Design, Art and Technology (CEDAT), which provided them with funding and mentorship from leading professors in the college.
They have gone on to participate in international competitions including the Wege prize in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA, in which they emerged 3rd overall, Climate Launchpad which happens to be the largest green business competition in the world, in which they reached the Global Finals in Amsterdam, Netherlands and more recently emerged winners in the International Engineering Students’ Conference, Projects Competition held at University of Nairobi, Kenya.
Some of the team members have created Hya bioplastics which looks at replacing existing petroleum-derived disposable cutlery with bio-degradable ones using the invasive water hyacinth as a major raw material. (Killing two birds with the same stone!!!)
They are currently developing prototypes despite the quarantine and they have reached the global finals for Invent For The Planet, which will be held at Texas A&M University as well as the Wege Prize that will be conducted online due to the current prevailing situation, i.e COVID-19. We definitely wish them the best!
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