by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Harvesting, that is to say, collecting, rainwater runoff from roofs of houses, garages and sheds is something that we must really think about when it comes to conservation of water, which is a very necessary thing seeing how we are abusing the wet stuff in general.
While in some parts of the USA the harvesting of rainwater is against the law of the state or against local ordinances in most countries it is totally legal to gather the water that runs off your roofs in water tanks of some sort for use.
In Britain, in fact, it is, so I understand, now going to be law that every new home built will have to have rainwater tanks installed. Here the harvested rainwater will become part of a gray-water system that will be used to irrigate the garden as well as to flush toilets. Most of those tanks are large, underground, affairs. This is, as regards to retrofitting, not always and option and there are overground versions available from water barrels to a variety of other kinds of rainwater tanks. Good slimline tanks are now becoming available too in many countries and some are slimmer than others.
Slimline tanks are intended to be attached to the walls of the house and properly affixed then can be painted to fit in with the exterior of the house are are thus very unobtrusive indeed. The slimmer they are while still having a real good storage volume the better, for sure.
Whichever way, however, we must, where we are prevented to do so by law, install rainwater harvesting tanks to catch the run off as not to waste it and waste drinking water for the watering of the garden and the flushing of the toilets.
Where the law prevents us to harvest rainwater we must make all efforts to change such laws, as they are, as we have seen, there only to benefit the likes of Coca Cola and other conglomerates who “need” the water their commercial activities, such as creating a bottled water from municipal sources, and such like.
It is, in fact, amazing to see that Americans, who often claim to be so much about personal freedoms actually have allowed the governments to make such legislations and ordinances that prevent someone from making use of the water that comes of his or her house, etc. Many great words by the people but very much apathy and not watching what the legislature is doing.
Rainwater harvesting, as far as I am concerned, is a must for all of us, whether we just intend to use the water to irrigate our garden, whether lawn or crops, or whether we are also going to have a gray-water system in our homes to reduce the use of drinking water for certain purposes. Event he washing machine supply could, if the pressure could be created, to such gray-water system using rainwater.
© 2009
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Rainwater Harvesting and Rainwater Tanks
