Water reuse for domestic consumption. A key element for environmental and econo...

• Author(s): Coimbra, José ; Almeida, Manuela Guedes de
• Date: 2013
• Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/1822/29019
• Origin: RepositóriUM - Universidade do Minho
• Subject(s): Cooperative housing; Sustainability; Water reuse
• Document Type: Conference Object
• Language: English

Description

In a context of increasing social awareness about resources conservation, residential water management is essential in ensuring environmental and economic sustainability. An adequate management is attained with integrated solutions, which simultaneously reduce potable water consumption at least in 25% and enable the storage of recovered water. The recovery and storage of underground water can be ensured with the installation of a groundwater drainage network and an underground water deposit, which will supply the residential toilet cisterns and the automatic irrigation systems through independent piping. These solutions aim to achieve high levels of water conservation with the aid of known materials, components and techniques, with as little interference as possible in residential comfort. They also reduce the interference in the water cycle, since less public water is used for residential consumption and the surrounding surface permeability is assured in order to allow the infiltration of rainwater into the soil. Due to water reuse, the cold potable water consumption in residential buildings can be reduced in up to 50% when compared to average consumption in buildings without recovery systems. Therefore, the environmental and economic impact analysis of water reuse leads to the conclusion that the investment has a five year payback period, after which it represents a real gain for residents.