DCU Community Garden Rain Water Harvesting (RWH )

From a global perspective clean potable water is an expensive ever diminishing resource this is absolutely vital for our continued existence. Measures to reduce demand on mains water supply will not only have economic benefits with the introduction of water charges but will also have significant environmental and societal benefits. DCU has a strong focus on demonstrating sustainable practices and when challenged with no running water on our Community Garden site an interdisciplinary group of innovative students from the DCU Green Committee looked to address the issue by installing a rainwater harvesting scheme from reused and up-cycled materials. Photo/logo The DCU Green Committee water team consisting of Brendan Heery (Chem Postgrad), Abdul Hassan (Elec Eng 4th yr), Alan Mangan (DCU Estates), Ciprian Briciu-Burghin (Chem Postgrad), Niall Durham (Chem Postgrad), and Emmet Galvin (MEng Postgrad) designed and constructed the RWH system, pictured below, to supply water to the Community Garden for watering of plant, washing of tools etc. Water is collected from the front sides of the two shed roofs and with a holding tank capacity of 800 litres this initiative has made a significant reduction in the use of main water as well as educating and informing the garden participants, many of whom are from the local community, that a simple inexpensive systems can be made that saves money and benefits the environment. Water is collected from the front sides of the two shed roofs and with a holding tank capacity of 800 litres this initiative has made a significant reduction in the use of main water as well as educating and informing the garden participants, many of whom are from the local community, that a simple inexpensive systems can be made that saves money and benefits the environment.