Partnership at Boshoek primary school in South Africa

Boshoek Smelter, a Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture operation, has partnered with GreenSource, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and local government school to build a combined synthetic turf and water storage and filtration system.

In an effort to create sustainable communities, Boshoek Smelter unveiled the state of the art, combined synthetic turf and water storage and filtration system, at Boshoek Primary School, last week. The school celebrated the community initiative and support for sports development with, members of the community, media and popular Premier Soccer League football club, Platinum Stars.

After identifying and resolving the water supply infrastructure in surrounding communities in just under five years, the Boshoek Smelter, set their sights on enhancing the quality of life for learners in the neighbouring school.
Built over an eight-week period, the synthetic turf will be used as a soccer pitch at Boshoek Primary School. Not only will the synthetic turf be used for sport development, but also used as a water storage facility that can hold 65,000 litres. The turf stores borehole and rainwater, to provide safe, drinking water to the school and the Boshoek community.

Underneath the pitch, which serves as a harvesting system, are crates that are made of recycled plastic, which collects and stores, borehole and rainwater. Once the water is depleted in the storage facility, the system automatically switches over to the school’s borehole, which pumps the water into the storage facility where the same cleaning process is used to purify the water. “This filtration system is unique, in that it removes all viruses, bacteria, and suspended solids from the water, but retains the essential minerals. It can produce clean drinking water at a rate of 50 litres per minute and 17 million litres per annum. The learners and community members are now able to enjoy the benefits of drinking nutritional water,” says Corné Theunissen, Director at GreenSource.

“We are extremely grateful for what the synthetic turf will mean for the school and learners. The parents are so excited to hear that their children will be coming home with clean purified water,” says the school’s principal, Patrick Mokgoatlheng.

“The project created numerous local job opportunities, impacting on the community beyond the provision of water. Residents will now be trained and skilled to install and maintain the facility”, says the general works manager of Boshoek Smelter, Francois Coetzee.

“We identified Boshoek Primary School as a possible beneficiary after having discussions with the school’s leadership. This initiative is a landmark project which not only serves as a sports facility, but also, as a means to provide the community with access to clean running water,” said Kabelo Mondi, CSR Manager at Glencore.