Students with the First Lego League Robotics Team have developed an app they want the city to use to address waste water usage in North Bay.

One of their projects is to look at a real life problem, so the students took tours of the water treatment plant and the waste water treatment plant.

W.J. Fricker grade 7 student Aidan Desilets says they discovered a big problem.

“We know that a few times each year our facility simply can not withstand the waste water collected and is sometimes is not fully treated before being flushed into Lake Nipissing,” he says.

Desilets says the government has the ability to stop new development if a city can’t process waste water within the guidelines.

Fellow Fricker grade 7 student Teagan Kingston says they developed an app called ‘Hydro Fit’.

“With the app users will be more aware of their usage and will be provided with suggestions to lower usage through push notifications which could lead to a reduction in waste water production,” Kingston says.

Mayor Al McDonald liked what he heard.

“This is an opportunity for our Managing Director of Public Works to review the app idea and bring back suggestions or ideas and say if the idea is doable or not,” he says.

Their teacher Andrea Lefebvre says the students took the assignment to heart.

“And we kind of laughed at their idea at first because we don’t think like that as adults. They were able to come up with a solution based on the app creation they had in their mind. And together the grade 7’s and the grade 4’s came up with Hydro Fit,” she says.