Quote:
Originally Posted by aigel
Do more math. How much rain do you get and when? How big is the surface area you can collect? Only if you get multiple rains throughout the year this will this make any sense. Otherwise your storage requirements are tremendous.
In my situation, doing the math, I realized that I would collect water only in winter and need a huge storage cistern which would be emptied in about 3 months worth of summer usage. Sure, I would save all that water, but it would be a very expensive project putting in a 15000 gallon tank.
It makes sense to catch rain water in climates where you see a good rain at least every month. If it is a rainy season - one time a year event - it makes no sense.
For me, it will be easier to further reduce water usage. I already dropped it by about 50% and have more front yard plans towards low water usage plants and replacing the lawn with gravel ...
G
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This.
My usage over the winter is around 5k gallons per month which is for a family of four.
That starts to ramp pretty quick once summer hits.
In July we peaked at 52,000 for the month.
For the 4 months of June to Sept the total usage was 150,000+
So 130,000 of that was for external watering.
We got enough rain this spring to cover the entire state of TX 8 inches deep in water.
Then, drought.
We get enough monsoons where it's feasible to collect enough water for summer but it's not realistic to have the capacity unless you dig a pond.