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EPFL
One campus fountain avoids 24,000 plastic bottles a year
24,000
plastic bottles avoided per year
48,000
users per year
12,000 L
drinking water served per year
At a glance
Client: EPFL, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne
Site: Campus water dispensers
Instrumented: Filtered water fountains
Kit: iLink with Flow & Temperature sensor
Period: 5 weeks in 2019, extrapolated to a year
The challenge
The university wanted to show students the impact of grid water over bottled water — and to service fountain filters on time.
What we installed
- iLink — One per fountain
- Flow & Temperature — Litres and uses
Alarms that did the work
- Consumable flow capacity reached · Critical — max_flow_quantity_reached · filter capacity, at lunchtime peaks
What the data showed
Lunchtime rush
Fountains run at full steam over lunch — when filter capacity is most at risk.
Cheap water, big impact
About 0.05 CHF per litre, against bottled water.
Results
- Bottles avoided: 24,000 / year — Extrapolated from 5 weeks
- Users: 48,000 / year — Extrapolated from 5 weeks
- Water served: 12,000 L / year — Extrapolated from 5 weeks
- Cost of water: 0.05 CHF / L — Grid water, filtered
Droople case study, May 2022 (data collected in 2019).