Guest Speaker: Jim Paul

Engineers Without Borders - USA

Jim Paul

Jim Paul is a professional engineer and father of four, with 30 years of experience engineering mechanical systems for buildings. He is currently a Vice President at Peter Basso Associates, Inc. In 2007 he joined Engineers Without Borders-USA, and in 2008 became a member of the Detroit Professional Chapter of EWB.

Engineers Without Borders USA was started in 2002 and currently has a total of 12,000 professional and student members working on 350 projects in over 45 developing countries. The EWB mission is to change the world, one community at a time, by designing and implementing small scale, sustainable engineering projects to meet basic human needs.

Established in April 2007, the Detroit Professional chapter of has been gaining momentum ever since. Their first project consisted of designing and installing a new potable water system in Las Glorias, Honduras, a community that previously had no water supply. This project was completed in October 2008 and currently supplies a growing community of 72, with capacity to supply as many as 215 inhabitants with clean drinking water for the next 20 years.

EWB then undertook a similar project in Buenos Aires. Before this project, a single source supplied water to only 26 of 60 families, creating shortages and health hazards for many community members. The Buenos Aires project includes a new main conduction line, storage tank, and distribution piping to newer regions in the community. EWB started this project in February 2009 and construction is currently nearing completion.