ChakraPaani: A ‘Solar Hand Pump’ to End Rural India’s Water Woes

The MSME sector is proving its worth in the age of innovation and creativity. One such firm in Kanpur, Shri Ram Rashmi Industries has come up with a new solar hand pump called ChakraPaani which it claims needs just a third of solar energy electricity compared to other solar pumps. When the radiation is low, one can also operate the pump with hands but in a rotary mode which makes easy for people of all ages to operate it.

Speaking to Saur Energy, Founder and technical head Anurag Verma is very optimistic about the prospects for ChakraPaani.

The Idea Of ChakraPaani

Anurag Verma was moved by the fact that certain sections of society are yet to get reliable source of clean drinking water as they live in remote areas in scattered habitations, tribal hamlets and hilly villages. The water systems in the interiors operate mainly through grid-electricity. Often, villagers are not able to pay fixed bill against water facility. Anurag also suspected the long term utility of a conventional grid operated water supply system.

Hence, Anurag and his team developed ChakraPaani which is a novel solar operated water pump system. It has a submersible pump, a rotary hand pump, a battery system and an automatic solar lighting system.

It was developed after observing performances of already available solar pumps in the market meticulously. Other solar pumps are less acceptable to remote areas because of their higher initial costs. The most costly component is solar panels.

On the other hand, ChakraPaani operates only on power input of 300W derived from solar panel and claims to deliver water output that is comparable with a 1 HP solar submersible pump. The utility of the product is enhanced by its other utility – ChakraPaani could also be hand operated in convenient rotary mode on long cloudy days when solar irradiance is weak or absent. This is not possible with conventional submersible pumps. This unique feature has generated strong acceptability of ChakraPaani in the market, claims Verma.

The solar hand pump also comes equipped with a small ‘lithium iron phosphate battery’ (LiFePo4 battery) which helps mitigate fluctuations caused by changes in solar radiations. Households also use this battery for the ‘automatic’ solar street-lighting to ward off darkness.

ChakraPaani seeks to be a complete mini water supply system. It comes with an automatic on-off system in the overhead tank and dry run protection.

Anurag Verma says, "With above mentioned features, we offer ChakraPaani at one-third price of conventional Solar Dual Pump and got great response from various Gram Panchayats, Jal Nigam, private sectors etc." At present, the product is available at Rs 54,500 with GST. The company is primarily focusing on states like Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand.

ChakPaani's operating cost is zero which makes its maintainability at village level easy. The solar hand pump presently caters to the water needs of 15 – 20 households. It could be installed at 300 feet deep into borewell and fill up water tanks upto 30 feet high on a building. ChakraPaani can benefit these villages that are remote and off-grid.

Battery Makes It Better

The company discovered that malfunctioning in other solar pumps is mainly caused by sudden changes in solar radiation. This causes sudden changes in motor rpm that deteriorates the life of motor also. "To overcome this issue in our pump, we equipped ChakraPaani with 12 AH & 24V LiFePo4 explosion proof battery to make our system durable and maintenance free."

To popularize ChakraPaani in the rural segments, the company displayed its pump in various Kisan Melas, Panchayat offices, Important Institutes, Jal Shakti Ministry programmes etc. The company says that consumer response is great and it has received appreciations from various small scale/cottage industries. The company has installed about 25 ChakraPaani units in industrial facilities while some rural customers are using it for ‘drip irrigation’ purposes also.

Production

The company was funded under government's Standup India Scheme.

Shri Ram Rashmi Industries has established a manufacturing facility to cater the need of 300 ChakraPaani systems per month. Till date, the company has installed about 60 ChakraPaani systems. Enquiries are also being sought from various African countries about the product.

"We are quite confident that these enquiries will be turned into purchase orders in coming months only. Hence, we are in the planning stage where we intend to enhance our manufacturing facility upto 600 ChakraPaani per month," adds Anurag Verma.

Technology and R&D

ChakraPaani solar hand pump is equipped with unique type of counter weight which balances weight of connecting rods and pressure force of water column in rise pipe effectively so that pump can be driven by using 250 W motor only. The motor is placed in surface assembly and it transfers power to reciprocating piston through connecting rods. Once this piston reciprocates inside subsurface cylinder then water starts lifting.

Anurag Verma informs, "We have applied for a patent for the same counter weight technology and the patent application is at final evaluation stage."

The product could be purchased through India Mart and also from it's the official website of Shri Ram Rashmi Industries.