Hi Guys. Well in 2017 rainwater harvesting is even more of a hot topic than when this article first came out. APD are now very heavily involved in rainwater re-harvesting and have products to suit.
We are seeing large companies now harvesting water to save money and alot of that water is getting treated and reused also.
John Key opened the new depot of Ritchies, the New Zealand bus tours institution. The Auckland-based depot boasts a 160,000-litre underground tank for recycling rainwater to provide washing facilities for the 200 buses stationed there.
This got me thinking – once a necessity in rural harvesting and third world water irrigation, the trend for rainwater harvesting, from the art world to your backyard, is fast growing.
And why not? Latest studies tell us that only 3 per cent of the water New Zealanders use in our homes is used for drinking. The rest is flushed down the drains and toilet, and sprayed onto our lawns. Pretty hard to swallow, right?
Rising water bill rates and awareness on environmental impact has Kiwis looking to the alternative: free water from the sky!
Installing rainwater tanks is simple and inexpensive. Water is collected from your roof and kept in the tank for common household needs such as watering the garden, flushing the toilet and washing laundry.
There are some council areas that require homeowners to treat or purify the rainwater before drinking, so consider the costs of this if you’d like to feed a water tank to your kitchen taps.
After the Canterbury earthquakes in 2011, residents were without water for weeks.
Following this, the government strongly recommends rainwater tanks for emergency water after a natural disaster.
Households will need 4200L of water for a family of four to be available, which is necessary for drinking, cooking and hygiene.
While traveling abroad after getting married, I missed New Zealand’s juicy fruit and vegetables, especially the organic gems grown in my parent’s back garden.
For a year-round irrigation system, my family has recently planted their vege patch at the bottom of the garden. Using gravity, rainwater runs down from the water tank through a drip irrigation system onto the roots of the plants. I can report that it’s cut their water bill right down.
For more details on whether a rainwater tank is right for you, consult APD today
Throughout the summer of 2016, tourists gathered to look skywards at a rainbow over an art gallery in Omaha, Nebraska.
What made this rainbow special were the thousands of litres of rainwater, captured in a largely constructed water harvester, sprayed into the sky by a 60-horsepower pump to create a dense wall of sparkling colour – see therainbow.org.nz for more on artist Michael Jones McKean’s brilliant installation.
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