Water supply and runoff capture reliability curves for hypothetical rainwater harvesting systems for locations across the U.S. for historical and projected climate conditions

Abstract

The data presented in this article are related to the research article entitled “Assessing climate change impacts on the reliability of rainwater harvesting systems” (Alamdari et al., 2018) [1]. This article evaluated the water supply and runoff capture reliability of rainwater harvesting (RWH) systems for locations across the U.S. for historical and projected climate conditions. Hypothetical RWH systems with varying storage volumes, rooftop catchment areas, irrigated areas, and indoor wSater demand based upon population from selected locations were simulated for historical (1971–1998) and projected (2041–2068) periods, the latter dataset was developed using dynamic downscaling of North American Regional Climate Change (CC) Assessment Program (NARCCAP). A computational model, the Rainwater Analysis and Simulation Program (RASP), was used to compute RWH performance with respect to the reliability of water supply and runoff capture. The reliability of water supply was defined as the proportion of demands that are met; and the reliability of runoff capture was defined as the amount stored and reused, but not spilled. A series of contour plots using the four design variables and the reliability metrics were developed for historical and projected conditions. Frequency analysis was also used to characterize the long-term behavior of rainfall and dry duration at each location. The full data set is made publicly available to enable critical or extended analysis of this work.