Madeline Abrams, a high school student from Upper Saddle River, will present on Zoom on April 18 at 7 p.m. the environmentally-friendly way she developed to capture rainwater using discarded plastic bottles to create an irrigation system for vegetable gardens and landscapes.
By using empty plastic bottles, cutting them in half lengthwise, and connecting them with waterproof tape, Madeline has created a gutter system to capture the rainfall that comes off of a roof. She then uses water bottles to create a downspout to direct the water to a holding tank similar to a rain barrel.
Here is a link to the website she created, Harvest Every Drop, to share her intervention: http://harvesteverydrop.com
Madeline recently presented her rain harvesting system virtually to 45 communities in New York, California, Uganda Namibia, Lesotho, Angola and South Africa. Her invention is being shared with villages and communities as a way to conserve water and address the issue of up-cycling plastic waste which has become a major problem in many parts of the world and in our area. An article about Madeline's system was recently published in an international Rotary magazine covering Uganda.
Here is the registration link for Madeline's program:https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZwtcOisqD00GdOmdfRmAurvF3MY-calVGj2
After the presentation, Madeline will share the instructional video she created as a reference to build her watering system to help communities harvest every drop.
Madeline's goal is to spread her innovation as far and wide as possible to benefit communities and to help people harvest every drop.