Atlas Copco honors World Water Day

Water for All's project in the Himalayas

More than 660 million people live without safe water supply close to home, according to the United Nations. This has enormous health consequences and typically forces mainly women and children to spend much of their time queueing up for water or walking to distant sources. One of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals aims for everyone to have safe access to clean water by 2030.

“Atlas Copco has long recognized the global need for safe water,” said Sofia Svingby, Vice President Corporate Responsibility. “Through our community initiative, responsible use of resources in our facilities, and our energy-efficient products we are contributing to the UN’s goal on clean water and sanitation.”

In 2016, Atlas Copco reduced water consumption in its facilities by 8% in water-stressed areas. Since 1984, the Group’s main community initiative is Water for All, an employee-run organization that provides people in need with long-term access to clean drinking water. Through voluntary donations, boosted by the Atlas Copco Group, this non-profit organization has so far provided clean drinking water to almost 2 million people.

Providing water to people in need is not only about drilling, digging and securing natural springs. As an example, Water for All is sponsoring an innovative project in the Himalayas in northwestern India. The project, in the Kugshok village in the Ladakh region, revolves around an artificial glacier that in the winter builds up a massive amount of ice in a controlled way. During spring and summer, the ice melts, providing much-needed water to the crops below.

The need for solutions like this has grown in recent years as the region’s natural glaciers have retreated amid a warmer climate.  The project is extremely energy efficient as it uses gravity to disperse the water and involves no machines