Harnessing Our Most Precious Resource:
A Look at the U. of Arizona’s New Buildings
Daniel Gust, J.J. Istrin, Blake McCay, Lincoln Perino, and Amanda Talesnick,
Dr. Riley’s, UNVR 195 Water Resources in the TucsonBasin, Fall 2003
Abstract:
Tucson, as a desert region, receivesapproximately eleven inches of annual precipitation. Active water management processes are crucial due to the low amounts of precipitation in the arid desert. This project has looked at new structuresbuilt on the University of Arizona campus and analyzed the possibility of integrating water harvesting to their design. Wespecifically located and analyzed the possibilitiesfor the Institute for Biomedical Sciences and Biotechnology (IBSB) building, The Highland Commons Area andthe Euclid Graduate Housing Areas. It was decided toalleviate some of the problems by using two waterharvesting systems. The Invisible Structures Companywas used as a storage device and the Southwest PVCompany provides a solar energy based water pumpingdevice. We contacted the Campus’s Facilities Design and Construction (FDC) to find therooftop areas and collect the necessary waterharvesting information for the selected sites. Water harvesting can easily be done at the three sites mentioned previously. These areas once constructed will have areas in which, Rainstore3 a product from Invisible Structures, and the 9200-Series Pump, a product from Southwest PV Company, can be placed and utilized. With the water harvested from these areas the necessary irrigation requirements can easily be met for the planned and/or existing vegetation.
Harnessing Our Most Precious Resource:
A Look at the U. of Arizona’s New Buildings
Introduction:
Tucson, as a desert region, is uniquely affected bylack of sufficient natural precipitation. There are no longer any running rivers or streams from which water could be drawn for irrigation. Water is thus ascarce commodity in the desert and cities in themiddle of it, such as Tucson, must conserve everydrop they get. The idea of rainwater harvesting is the collection ofrainwater runoff to be used for productive purposes at a later time. Instead of letting the water simply run off and possibly lead to erosion,it can be put to good use. The capture and containment ofrainwater is a productive form of water conservation,in that it doesn’t simply use water that is beingpumped from the ground. Water harvesting can beused for irrigation as it allowsfarmers or home gardeners to prescribe the rightamount of water at the right time for optimal plantgrowth, without the usage of groundwater.
Rainwater harvesting is not just for farmers and gardeners; anyflora in an arid landscape can also benefit. This project will be looking at how buildings on the University of Arizona’s campus can beused to minimize the amount of groundwater requiredfor campus landscapes. The hope is to find a way for theUniversity to integrate water harvesting into some ofthe plans for construction in the near future. In doing so, the school can minimize its impact on Tucson’s water tables as well as save money on the current use of groundwater.In terms of the environmentand the long term longevity of the school, it is inthe best interest to start finding solutions to foreseeable issues before they become irreversible.
In order to keep the scale of the project manageablethis project will focus on two areas of recent andupcoming construction. It will also includeinformation for other newer buildings but only assupport for the foci. Specifically, the interest isin the Highland Commons area located west of HighlandAve. to the north of 6th Street. These buildings areall nearing completion if not already complete. Thesecond area of focus is the new graduate housing along EuclidAve. west of Tyndall Garage and north of CoronadoResidence Hall. These buildings are already completebut have not had their landscaping completed. Thiscomplex has also already had gutters installed andplans for getting the water away from the building asfast as possible. The Institute for Biomedical Sciences and Biotechnology (IBSB) area nearHelen and Drachman is to be considered in this project as well. The IBSB sitedoesn’t have any finished construction and the designcan still be manipulated to some extent. For this reason it was chosen to be the first to include rainwater harvesting in the original construction. These areas were chosen because oftheir relative youth as well as their size and currentwater needs.
Materials and Methods:
In order to obtain information the FacilitiesDesign and Construction Department at the University ofArizona were contacted. The campus contact was Grant McCormack, thecampus planner. Grant had limited information and wasonly able to give us general background informationabout current projects on campus. From Grant’s information wereceived the names of two other contacts, DennisMcCarthy, construction project manager, and RodneyMackey, manager of design with the FDC. We were able to set up aninterview with Rodney Mackey to learn more about theUniversity’s basic water harvesting plans, as well aslearn about certain projects on campus to help usfocus our interests in specific areas. After choosingthree areas of focus for the projectblueprints, plans, and other constructiondetails regarding the chosen projects were obtained.
Researchwas done to gain knowledge of possible ways toharvest water from these buildings and found that theInvisible Structure was quite useful because it is veryefficient, easy to install, and needs littlemaintenance. The website for the company which createsthe invisible structure, a plethora of information on thistype of water harvesting.
Also found was a type of harvesting, which uses solarenergy to pump the water it needs. Thewebsite is, and from the site it was learned that it is possible to pump water from the invisible structure tosurrounding plants and vegetation with their products. This solar methodis particularly effective here in Arizona where it isalmost always sunny because it does not increase the energy costs for the University.
Results:
From evaluation of the blueprints, the roof surface area for all three of the chosen locations was calculated. The Highland Commons Area is divided into threeseparate houses, which each have a rooftop area of15,184 sq. ft. The total rooftop area for this projectis 45,552 sq. ft. With this information, itis possible to collect a total of 40,997 cubic feet ofwater annually, harvesting enough water to feed 11,388ft2 of turf. All of this water can be stored and saved for irrigating the vegetation during the appropriate times of the year. This amount of water can easily meet the irrigation requirements for the existing vegetation, and can eliminate the need for using groundwater, or additional water. This surrounding vegetation consists of15 palm trees, 119 courtyard trees, 9 raised planters,and 13,250 sq. ft. of ground cover.
The Euclid Ave. Graduate Housing apartments arealmost fully completed, but at this point thevegetation has yet to be installed. The surface areaon the roofs of the buildings total 56,500 sq. ft.This means that it is possible to collect 50,850cubic feet of storable water per year with the capacity to water 14,125ft2 of turf. With the water that can be collected from water harvesting there is enough to water the planned vegetation for the Graduate Housing and will eliminate the need for using groundwater. This vegetationplan is designed to have 189 trees,1,032 shrubs, 1,485 accents, 2,179 groundcover plants,and 69 vines.
The new IBSB building located at the northeast cornerof Helen and Warren, is in the earliest stages ofconstruction. On the last site visit it was observed thatthe lot had just been cleared, and a fence had recentlybeen installed around the area. Designs for theproject include a new structure with five floors, plusa penthouse, with a peculiarly shaped rooftop. Theestimated surface area of the rooftop is 33,706 sq.ft. With this size roof area a possible annual yieldof rainwater harvesting will be 30,335 cubic feet. This Amount of water could water 8,426.5ft2 of turf. If water harvesting is used in this area, the surrounding vegetation can be sufficiently irrigated for the entire year.
Discussion:
In all three of the building projects plans,invisible structures can easily be added to thedesign in order to harvest and store water efficiently andeconomically. From the roofs of each of the structuresgutter and pipes can be constructed to gather andtransport precipitation runoff from the roofs. Thesepipes can connect to the water storage systemunderground. The storage system that is suggested beused is a product called Rainstore3 constructed byInvisible Structures Incorporated. Rainstore3 is alow maintenance product that is easy to install andhas low cost. Rainstore3 is a structure composed of36 small cylindrical columns in one unit made fromhigh density polyethylene. One unit occupies a spaceof 1 sq. meter. These units can be stacked together,and can be as shallow as 1 meter, or as deep as 2.5meters in height, however they can have any length or widthin increments of one meter. Once the product is installed upto 94% of the available storage area can be filledwith water. This serves as a good storage tank withonly 6% of the collected water being lost toevaporation.
Once the water is collected within Rainstore3 thewater can be used for irrigation purposes on thesurrounding vegetation through a system of pumps thatwill be situated next to the invisible structures. Themost environmentally efficient pumps that should beused are manufactured and sold by a company calledSouthwest Photovoltaic Systems, Inc. The 9300 Seriessubmersible pumps have solar panels which collectsunlight. The pumps use the sunlight the generateenergy in order to pump water to the vegetation. The9300 Series submersible pump is an environmentallyfriendly option because the University of Arizonacampus receives approximately 320 days of sunshine peryear. In the driest times of the year the pumps willsend the necessary amount of water to the vegetation,and on the days where there is less sunlight, theplants will not receive unnecessary water.
Conclusion:
The goal was to obtain information about the waterharvesting possibilities of newly constructedbuildings and new buildings under design. The reasonfor this is because water is a scarce commodity in theSonoranDesert. Specifically, three areas oncampus were located, which fit the previously mentionedprofile. The three areas are: The Highland buildingstructures, The Euclid graduate student housing, andthe IBSB building. Approximately120,000 cubic feet of water per year could be harvested from these three buildingsalone.The decision was made to use products from InvisibleStructures and Southwest P.V. Inc. These productscould store water until it is needed, andcould pump the harvested water, as it is needed by thevegetation.
References:
Grant McCormick, Campus Planner
Rodney Mackey, Senior Architect
Invisible Structures Inc.
Southwest PV Inc.
The Basis of Water Harvesting: History andProspective
Blueprints and Designs for the: Euclid Housing
Project, IBSBBuilding, Highland Commons Area
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