[Inspired]

Do any of you have experience with rain water harvesting systems? Water is becoming more of an issue here, not like Cali but the conservation interest is growing. I've been thinking of trying to put a system package together to offer my customers.

Any links or info is appreciated.

[GLAN]

Kisich

No I have no experience, but....I would like to ask


I am wondering as to how much water you intend to collect from rain?...........how long you think you can store it?............then, how will it be used?


My thoughts on those questions;

How much one can collect........that I would think is dependent on the storage device. Or multiples of.

Now here is a thought.......I guess you guys heat with electric.....where I am......oil and gas.........gas is piped in, where oil is delivered by truck and pumped into a couple hundred gallon tank.....now I am thinking.......that would be a good recepticle to collect rain water in............how to preserve it?.........I am thinking in ground. Above ground you may run into evaporation problems.

But how many tanks would one need?.........one at every down spout?......

What use for the water.........we're only talking hundreds of gallons.........Not enough for turf to be worth the expense or effort...........so how about shrub beds........drip, soak, what ever........But that seems most logical.

Need of a pump, hoses. Access to the pump in the tank for what ever may go wrong........but lets say a 250 gallon tank...........how much water can that supply a planting bed..........or should I say, how much planting bed will that tank supply and for how long?

What happens in the summer months........tanks are empty and no rain.

Considering the variables.........cost of installing such a system........is it cost effective in the long run........or annualy for that matter?

[Nathaniel Carr]

Have you ever seen this:
http://invisiblestructures.com/index.html

[agla]

I was involved in a rain collection sytem last summer. It involved a very large mansion that was being restored on town owned property. The town has a very active environmental community and some real groundwater issues, so they have a policy of not allowing irrigation on town owned property.

Without going into it too much, we needed to do everything we could to limit the need to tap into the town water supply to irrigate the 5,000 SF of lawn needed for use on the site. The idea is that with enough conservation methods in place, the town would let us irrigate when/if it became absolutely necessary.

The house already had a 5,000 gallon brick cistern under ground from its original occupant (1878). We connected some of the downspouts of the house to it. We also added a 10,000 gallon tank (new setic tank specifically for this use, and there are plans and piping set up for yet another 10,000 gallon tank. The total being 25,000 gallons of stored water. That is a lot of water.

That sounds like a lot of water at least. But that is only 3" of irrigation water spread over that 5,000 SF of lawn. I'm told that irrigation of lawn should be about 1" per week. That is 3 weeks worth of irrigation, if there is no rainfall in between.

I have to question whether that is cost effective. In this case it had more to do with politics than cost effectiveness.

The technical part for removing the water and getting it into the irrigation system is incomplete at this point. I am no longer with the engineering company that was working on the project, but I had spoken to someone from Rainbird on the matter. They were eager to help, but I felt that they wanted to overcomplicate it (and sell more in the process), so we did not pursue their assistance.

Our concept was to use a well pump (and pressure tank) out of one tank and use the other two to replenish the supply tank at a slower rate with smaller pumps using 1" poly pipe to refill. Float switches would be used to trigger the movement from the secondary tanks. The roof runoff goes to these tanks now and there are overflow pipes that drain to daylight. We used 6"pvc pipes with a cleanout and sump just a few feet away from each downspout. Debris would drop out into the sump and a screen should be in place to keep the floaties from continuing past the cleanout.

The idea of re-using roof runoff from small roofs with only a few hundred gallons storage seems to be a more work than benefit in the climate I'm in. We have problems with mosquito carried diseases (eastern equine enciphilitis and West Nile Virus), so standing water is very much discouraged. Maybe the water is much more valuable and goes farther in desert conditions, if you are using desert plants.

[Inspired]

Originally posted by Nathaniel Carr
Have you ever seen this:
http://invisiblestructures.com/index.html

Thanks for the link. Very interesting.

Glan: It only rains 8" a year here, so I'm not sure how it could pay off anytime soon for a homeowner. However, I hear more and more people talking about water conservation and complaints about the size of thier water bills. I thought I would play around with it at my house and see how it works out.


Agla: We have some mosquito issues here to. However, I'm thinking along the lines you mentioned, desert plants and politically correct clients. Its funny what people will spend money on. Every time I see one of those Hummers with the giant polished wheels and chrome all over it I think, why not?