World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2019
Advanced Rainwater Harvesting through Smart Rain Barrels
Publication: World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2019: Watershed Management, Irrigation and Drainage, and Water Resources Planning and Management
ABSTRACT
Recent technological advances in information and communication technology (ICT) have opened new opportunities for monitoring and controlling of micro-scale low impact development (LID) practices almost in real-time. In this work, the smart rain barrel (SRB) concept combines LID and ICT in one system allowing new possibilities for the operation and management of small storage volumes used as temporary storage for stormwater control as well as for rainwater harvesting. To support the development of the SRBs, the effectiveness of the SRB concept on household scale is evaluated by using a 1-year rainfall series combined with real weather forecasts for that period. Results show, that stormwater retention is clearly increased by adding weather forecast to control strategies, while the amount of substituted potable water decreases with increasing accumulation time of the weather forecast. However, as the main purpose of rainwater harvesting is the substitution of potable water used for irrigation, the main challenge for small storage volumes used for both rainwater harvesting and stormwater control, is the accurate prediction of the stormwater runoff.
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Acknowledgements
This research was funded by the Climate and Energy Fund within the Smart Cities program (project number 858782).
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Information & Authors
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Published In
World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2019: Watershed Management, Irrigation and Drainage, and Water Resources Planning and Management
Pages: 75 - 82
Editors: Gregory F. Scott and William Hamilton, Ph.D.
ISBN (Online): 978-0-7844-8233-9
Copyright
© 2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Published online: May 16, 2019
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