There is a long list of reasons about why you should harvest rainwater. Harvesting the rain does more than help the environment through decreased water runoff, it can also help save your well. Now say you are starting to feel for your poor well, it is stressing itself (and you) out, and you have a vision of water stress freedom – you are laying the groundwork for you rainwater system. How will this benefit your well?
Of course, it depends on the type of system that you are installing. If it’s strictly for gardening and landscaping, you will be saving potentially thousands of gallons of water from your well and your aquifer – at the time of year when it is most distressed. This type of system also just happens to be one of the easiest and most cost efficient systems to get going.
The next system up from this may be strictly rainwater for flushing and washing. Thinking back to our previous post “Facts about water use”, flushing and clothes washing is 40% of your household use and you could be saving over 200 L/day alone. If this is coupled with gardening and landscaping uses, you are seriously reduce the load on your water well. Don’t feel bad now about letting the kids use the sprinkler!
But lets take it one step further. What if your rainwater system supplies your house AND our outdoor needs, and then you well is there only for a back up. You have become, essentially, water rich and aquifer independent. Of course, you can keep your well functioning for back up or top-up uses. The load on it at that point will be minimal. Now – having a bath tub doesn’t make use feel so guilty.
At MyRain, we do these types of rainwater feasibility studies all the time. We show you how each type of system will reduce your volume of pumped water and how much tankage it will take to get there. And of course, how much that might cost. If you are on community water system, we can show you long it will take before your system pays for itself.
One added benefit to why you should harvest rainwater is this: you will become the unspoken hero of island power outages – with water storage on site, you will be the one in the neighbourhood still able to flush their toilets. Think of the bragging rights!