SOUTH JORDAN, Utah — A local non-profit organization is being celebrated by such luminaries as Governor Spencer Cox for making a difference all around the world. It all started with a South Jordan man’s idea that has now turned into a project changing millions of lives and still growing.
The human-powered Village Drill made by the Who Lives organization helps communities in foreign countries drill wells for much-needed fresh water. It was created by BYU engineering students, manufactured in Springville, and assembled in Utah being sent all across the world.
Four people stand around the Village Drill and in motion they turn the drill bit at the bottom. The tool will go through sand, clay, soft rock, and even granite.
It's a piece of equipment makes a precious resource available to many more people, and in turn changing lives.
"If [communities] are healthy and they have water, then that would create opportunity for the girls to go to school instead of fetching water, opportunities for the women to get industrious, so that became the acronym for Who Lives: that’s water, health and opportunity," explained Dir. of Operations Mike Anderson.
The organization's founder, John Rennaurd, said the non-profit started with a family vacation in 2010.
"I was just struck at how these women were enslaved every day to just go get water," he said.
Rennaurd wanted to do something to help, and through a series of fortunate events, the human-powered drills came dug their first wells in Tanzania two years later.
"So that’s kind of how it started and our life really hasn’t been the same since," said Rennaurd.
Every time Who Lives sends a drill to a new country, they put a flag on the map.
"We have a fantastic team in Liberia. In just the last two years, they drilled over 160 wells, with just one Village Drill. That’s brought clean water to over 200,000 people," Anderson shared.
It's a grassroots effort pushed forward by so many local companies that donates materials to build the drills. At least a dozen Utah companies also join with a payroll match to provide funding.
"One little company, I’ll just shout them out, is Redmond Salt," said Anderson. "Their employees do a little $5-a-month match. Last year, we were able to put in three wells in Africa, brought clean water to 3,000 people, right from just our little hometown company here in Utah."
To date, over 13,500 wells are spread out across this world in 40 different countries, and the organization claims it's finishing about 3-to-4 wells a day every single day.
CLICK HERE to donate to WhoLives.org which allows donors to pick a specific project where they can donate.
