Canada Life

CANADA LIFE REINSURANCE

Developing Ireland’s fi rst Smart Water Station

Canada Life Reinsurance, along with community partner O’Connell School in Dublin’s inner city, have launched Ireland’s fi rst Smart Water Station.

’Connell school is part of

Othe Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools programme, commonly known as a DEIS school. It serves a community with a diverse mix of nationalities in Dublin’s north inner city.

Canada Life Reinsurance partnered with O’Connell School to launch Ireland’s fi rst Smart Water Station. Number 12 of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is to ‘Ensure sustainable consumption,’ and this is also one of the four SDGs chosen by Canada Life Reinsurance to focus their attention on.

HEALTH AND WASTE The partnership identifi ed a challenge of children bringing sugar-based soft drinks to school every day and the impact this has not only on the children’s health, but also the increased amounts of unnecessary plastic waste in the school and its immediate environs.

A local supplier, Water Stations Ireland, was sourced, and a Smart Water Station—the fi rst of its kind in Ireland— was developed and manufactured locally in East Wall. The Smart Water Station provides data on usage on a dashboard; this information is then used as part of teaching, from maths projects to sustainability awareness.

Lynn Kidney, Deputy Principal of O’Connell School, says, “We are so grateful to have a clean, sustainable alternative to drinking water in school. Not only are we healthier, as we are not tempted to go to the shop and buy energy, sugary drinks but we are also learning about our carbon footprint. We are reducing the amount of plastic we use, which reduces the amount of carbon dioxide released into the air we breathe and we are helping marine life live in clean waters without plastic waste.”

VISIBLE IMPACT The dashboard can be viewed on a screen upon entering the school or online via www.oconnells.waterstations.ie. To date 1,720 plastic bottles have been saved by the distribution of 860 litres of water by the smart station. Another result of the ban on single-use plastics in the school is that it has improved the area with less waste on the school grounds and surrounding streets.

“This project was a natural fi t for us and the fact we can through the technology in place see the impact on carbon savings was great. It’s incredible to see the benefi ts from reducing the school’s carbon footprint to seeing the data from the fountain being used in school maths projects,” states Fergus Cooney, Head of Sustainability, Canada Life Reinsurance.

The impact of the project cannot be understated; it has developed a strong community partnership that will see students who have just completed their Leaving Certifi cate shortly start an apprenticeship with Canada Life Reinsurance. They will be supported with a business qualifi cation from a third level college to assist them on their journey of learning.