Water shortage is something that we have to face everywhere more and more with climate change. So the question is what can we do against that fact. More droughts in the summers make it more clear that that is a problem that we have to face. With the greenhouses of the Kaskantine we can collect a lot of water, easily 1000 liter with an average rainfall. Sand and active coal filters purify the water. Excess rainwater goes in the ponds and can be used for the garden.
Rain and climate change
Climate change means bad news for the water situation, especially in polders like the ones in Amsterdam. Basically it´s a clusterfuck: we have dryer summers, causing trouble for vegetation and lower groundwater tables causing decomposing peat, causing sinking land, causing more flooding. But in other seasons there is more and heavier rainfall, causing over demanded sewers and flooding.
Amsterdam Rain Proof policy So there is a big multidisciplinary problem. The Municipality of Amsterdam took the lead in setting up a multisectoral approach. The objectives are protecting trees and prevent low ground water tables but also prevent high ground water tables and flooding and prevent the need of investing in larger drainage and sewage systems. One of the main strategies is to ask and force investors and builders to make waterbuffers on roofs or in the ground. They managed to introduce an obligation of buffering 6 mm daily rain events and this will soon be raised to buffering 60 mm for one hour. Besides this they do pilot project for green rain proof roofs, and have public awareness campaigns with smalls scale projects that citizens can implement in their garden (decoupling rain pipe, less tiles, etc) ttps://www.rainproof.nl/sites/default/files/thesis_ellis_dupker_11026278.pdf
Quality Rainwater Luckily "humanity" managed to solve to a large extent the acid rain problem of the 80's. Rain is less polluted now, but still contains "fine dust", very small smoke particles. Water tend to condensate around dust particles. The first rain literally sweeps the air clean. On the roofs also the dusts is collecting. If you collect rain water, especially the first flush can be particularly polluted. Therefore first flush collectors are made (10 to 50 liter for household scale), quite easy to make and install before your rain storage. DescriptionThis wonderful system allows us to collect and purify rainwater. We use this water for kitchen operations, hygiene, and irrigation. This system, coupled with the Greywater system, is the core of our off-grid place. Thanks to it, we can function not connected to the city water infrastructure. In this system, rainwater is cleaned by slowly dripping through a thick layer of sand. It purifies the water, takes out dust and microbes, and slightly re-mineralises the water, just like in nature!