A national award has been won by Glos-based company Rainharvesting Systems Ltd, demonstrating how using rain before it goes down the drain can play a significant role in meeting our everyday water needs. The award-winning rainwater harvesting scheme has been picked as an inspirational example of how society can use water more sustainably, and how we can benefit from our frequently wet weather! This also means that the company has been involved with 3 award-winning schemes this year, which is great news for the UK’s longest supplier of rainwater harvesting systems.
Rainharvesting Systems Ltd worked with partner company, Natural Power UK, to design a rainwater harvesting system which enables the transport company Cardiff Bus to collect rainwater from the roof of their depot. The system was installed as part of a major refurbishment of the depot earlier this year. The system collects rain falling onto an area of the depot’s roof, cleans it and then stores it in a 26,000 litre tank. At the moment, more than 200 buses are washed everyday using water collected in this way. This scheme was chosen by The Sustainable Water Industry Group (SWIG) as the winner of the ‘Non-residential retrofit’ category in the SWIG Awards 2011.
SWIG is a national group bringing together over 100 companies and organisations working together to drive forward the wise use of water in the UK in all buildings and spaces. The group runs the SWIG Awards every year to provide inspiration and highlight examples of how we can use water in a more sensible, sustainable way. Rainwater harvesting involves collecting and using rainwater before it either falls onto the ground or flows into drains. It can be used for a wide variety of functions which don’t require drinking-quality water. The rainwater is used instead of mains water, helping to reduce the amount taken from rivers, natural water sources and reservoirs. In recent years, shrinking rivers and groundwater supplies have become more and more obvious, and in certain parts of the country the over-abstraction of water for human needs has been part of the cause.
“For me, the most important aspect of this award is the big spotlight that it shines on using rainwater, and that rainwater harvesting offers a credible, proven technique for helping to meet both our water needs and our responsibilities to the environment” said Derek Hunt, MD of Rainharvesting Systems. “The Cardiff Bus depot also demonstrates the flexibility of rainwater harvesting systems. Washing over 200 buses a day needs a lot of water, and the rainwater harvesting system meets this need. Yet rainwater can also be used in small developments where it flushes a few toilets.
Increasingly we’re supplying systems to commercial clients who use rainwater in their industrial processes. In the UK, our use of water is going up by 1% each year, but the amount of water available to us to use is fixed – water can’t be made or destroyed. There are places within the Severn region where demand is predicted to outstrip supply within the next few years. So we need to be putting into practise innovative methods of saving water, therefore reducing pressure on the environment.”
So far, buses have been washed with rainwater for just a few months, but in the first 5 weeks of operation 150m3 (150,000 litres) of rain was used instead of mains water – the equivalent of the amount of water held in approx 15,000 garden buckets! A monitoring unit built into the system will enable the bus company to know exactly how much mains water has been saved at the end of a year. And it’s not just water – using rain also saves money as water companies charge for all mains water used so less mains water means smaller bills. Win, win all round.