The Effectiveness of Rainwater Harvesting Infrastructure in a Mediterranean Island

Kakoulas, Dimitrios A.; Golfinopoulos, Spyridon K.; Koumparou, Dimitra; Alexakis, Dimitrios Ε.

doi:10.3390/w14050716

Cited by 16 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 68 publications

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“…The need to meet food security demands in the face of climate change-induced water stresses has directed many scientists to research various agricultural techniques that conserve soil and water, to maximize yield (among others; Farooq and Siddique, 2015;Bista et al, 2018;Bhattacharyya et al, 2020;USDA, 2020;Stanojevic, 2021). In high-income countries, engineering industries are also investing in more complex watersaving infrastructure for agricultural use (Rodriguez et al, 2021;Kakoulas et al, 2022). Today, engineering inventions make it possible to have agricultural machinery designed with controlled traffic measures for cost-effective and energy-saving farm operations without tilling the soil unnecessarily (Patel et al, 2018).…”

Section: Research and Implementation Accomplishments Gaps And Future ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil and water conservation measures to adapt cropping systems to climate change facilitated water stresses in Africa

Brempong

Amankwaa-Yeboah²,

Yeboah³

et al. 2023

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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Complex controls and non-linear responses of the climate system to global warming make it difficult to have clear-cut predictions of future precipitation amounts and timelines. It is, however, evident from current observations that some predictions of unusually high rates of flooding and droughts are occurring and threatening food security in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The impact of climate change is immense on SSA though it contributes the least to climate change globally. Crops face lots of growth challenges which reduce their productivity under drought and flood conditions. SSA must prepare agricultural soils for the anticipated climate variabilities, to ensure sustainable food availability. The effort to adapt soils to climate change must be a concerted one, using technologies from various facets of science. Stakeholders must adopt water-smart strategies that maintain proper soil-water balance. They should focus on manageable inherent soil properties that control the susceptibility/adaptability of cropping systems to climate change. Conservation agriculture techniques that target improving soil organic matter and maintaining soil life; protecting the soil from compaction and erosion; reducing soil disturbance; enhancing soil infiltration and groundwater recharge capacity, must be applied to our soils. A number of these techniques equip the soils to be better sinks of excess water in flood-prone areas and improve water-holding capacities in drought-prone ones. Governments, farmers, and all stakeholders must also invest in both simple and complex water harvesting/ re-directing infrastructure which conserve water for future use. Water-efficient irrigation systems must be employed by farmers during water scarcity. Most importantly, gaps between research, industry, farmers, and governments must be bridged to for easy flow of information on improved technologies and quick adoption of climate change mitigation strategies.

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Section: Research and Implementation Accomplishments Gaps And Future ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil and water conservation measures to adapt cropping systems to climate change facilitated water stresses in Africa

Brempong

Amankwaa-Yeboah²,

Yeboah³

et al. 2023

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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“…It is vital to emphasize the various upfront expenses associated with the infrastructure that makes it possible to deploy rainwater harvesting in households and the costs associated with maintenance and operation over the year [78]. The ability to save tap water, as well as capital and operational costs incurred throughout the system's operation, were also found to significantly impact the cost of employing the rainwater management system [75]. The option in which rainwater from the roof is dumped directly into the sewage system has a lower life cycle cost [79].…”

Section: Rainwater Harvesting Potential and Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In a study in Greece, RWH implied the potential to improve the quality of urban life concerning environmental values. The study claimed that social services such as education and social safety could be strengthened by supplying safe water in a long-term and sustainable manner using RWH [75]. In addition to economic growth strategies that emphasize the environment and promote industry and public engagement in environmental protection activities, nations should implement incentives and stringent environmental protection rules [82].…”

Section: Rainwater Harvesting Potential and Sustainabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Stormwater Harvesting from Roof Catchments: A Review of Design, Efficiency, and Sustainability

Bañas

Robles

Maniquiz-Redillas

2023

Water

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Roof runoff is collected rainwater from a roof using a rainwater harvesting system (RWHS). The construction of an efficient RWHS requires a thorough analysis of the rainwater quality and the appropriate treatment process for its intended use. In line with this, a bibliometric and comprehensive review of studies related to roof rainwater harvesting was conducted. A corpus of 1123 articles was downloaded from the Scopus database and parsed through the CorText Manager to determine the relationships between keywords, journals, and topics related to rainwater harvesting. A comprehensive analysis was also conducted to determine the different designs of RWHS, the quality of harvested rainwater from roof catchments, the efficiency of the system for specific purposes, and its sustainability in terms of economic, environmental, and social aspects. Results show that the effectiveness of a RWHS heavily depends on its installation site, the physicochemical characteristics of the harvested rainwater, and the acceptability of the end users. An effective water treatment process is essential for achieving better water quality for harvested rainwater. Moreover, assessing the financial viability and return on investment of an RWHS is necessary.

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“…In this work, we have performed two types of simulations based on a water balance model [38,39]. These simulations incorporate the water harvested by the greenhouse roof as well as the amount of water used for irrigation.…”

Section: Simulations Of Rainwater Collected By Greenhouse Roofsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is Greenhouse Rainwater Harvesting Enough to Satisfy the Water Demand of Indoor Crops? Application to the Bolivian Altiplano

Sayol

Azeñas²,

Quezada³

et al. 2022

Hydrology

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As many other regions worldwide, the Bolivian Altiplano has to cope with water scarcity during dry periods, which in turn impacts on crop production as flood irrigation is overwhelmingly extended in the region. Since farming is the main income in the Altiplano for most families, the availability of greenhouses with water harvesting systems may represent a solution to warrant all year round production and food access. We study the daily satisfied water demand from a balance between rainfall collected by a greenhouse roof and water used for indoor crop irrigation assuming a tank is available for water storage. This balance is analyzed for 25 greenhouses spread over Batallas Municipality, close to Titicaca Lake, Bolivia, and for two case studies: (i) using irrigation data collected from farmers in the frame of a regional project; (ii) using theoretical daily water requirements assuming an intense greenhouse farming. Our evaluation includes a sensitivity analysis of relevant parameters, such as the influence of the time window of rainfall used in the simulation, the runoff coefficient, the roof surface area, the irrigation drip system, the irrigation frequency, the crop coefficient, the volume of water used for crop irrigation, and the capacity of the water tank. Overall, we find that the runoff coefficient has little impact on the satisfied demand rate, while all other parameters can play an important role depending on the greenhouse considered. Some greenhouses are able to irrigate crops normally during the wet season, while during the dry season, greenhouses are not able to satisfy more than 50% of the theoretical water requirements, even when large tanks are considered. Based on these results, we recommend the construction of greenhouses with a ground surface of <50 m2 attached to the largest available covered water tank. The information here provided can be used by stakeholders to decide their policies of investment in infrastructures in the Altiplano. Finally, the approach we follow can be applied to any other region where rainfall, temperature, and greenhouse data are available.

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The Effectiveness of Rainwater Harvesting Infrastructure in a Mediterranean Island

Cited by 16 publications

References 68 publications

Soil and water conservation measures to adapt cropping systems to climate change facilitated water stresses in Africa

Soil and water conservation measures to adapt cropping systems to climate change facilitated water stresses in Africa

Stormwater Harvesting from Roof Catchments: A Review of Design, Efficiency, and Sustainability

Is Greenhouse Rainwater Harvesting Enough to Satisfy the Water Demand of Indoor Crops? Application to the Bolivian Altiplano

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