Sustainability in Water Provision in Rural Communities: the Feasibility of a Village Scale Rainwater Harvesting Scheme
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Sustainability in Water Provision in Rural Communities: the Feasibility of a Village Scale Rainwater Harvesting Scheme Caleb Christian Amos 1,2,3,4
& Amir Ahmed
2,5
& Ataur Rahman
1,2,3,6
Received: 2 April 2020 / Accepted: 20 September 2020/ # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract
Groundwater resources are often the main source of drinking water for remote communities, but they are increasingly found to be unsuitable, and a source of ill health in many parts of the world. High annual rainfall in monsoonal regions makes rainwater harvesting an attractive alternative, but lack of infrastructure for capturing and storing sufficient quantities is often restrictive. This study focuses on the coastal region of Bangladesh where groundwater supplying tubewells are progressively found to contain arsenic and high salinity, and where cyclones are a common cause of damage to infrastructure. The aim of this study is to evaluate the potential of a village scale rainwater harvesting scheme as a solution to water security concerns. Analysis of various size rainwater storage systems (RSS) is conducted using daily rainfall data from Khulna Station in Bangladesh. It was found that a village scale RSS with 3 m deep and 100 m by 100 m surface area could supply 100 L/p/d for 85% of the year. The reliability could feasibly be increased to 100% with seasonal water restrictions. The village scale RSS is compared with an individual household level RSS. Advantages of the village scale RSS include the opportunity for improved management and water quality monitoring, and the potential for public-private partnerships. The proposed methodology can be adapted to other monsoonal delta regions to enhance water supply. Keywords Bangladesh . Village scale schemes . Drinking water . Rainwater harvesting . Water supply
1 Introduction Access to safely managed drinking-water services is often limited by the availability of suitable water sources. About 15% of the world population do not have access to clean water. In many developing countries, the main source of drinking water is untreated groundwater. * Ataur Rahman [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
Amos C.C. et al.
However, unless properly managed, groundwater is not a sustainable resource (Shahid and Hazarika 2010). In rural groundwater supply, pump failure can also be a major issue leading to use of whatever low quality water is at hand, and increases incidents of diarrhoea (Thompson 2020). Contaminants present in groundwater may undermine the water supply such as high salinity, especially in coastal regions, fluoride, such as in the rift valley, and arsenic such as in Bangladesh (Rakib et al. 2020). Large dams may not be viable in absence of suitable topography. Desalination is expensive and has a high energy demand (Shamsuzzoha et al. 2018). Filtered pond water, bottled water and roof harvested rainwater storage systems (RSS) are some of the remaining options. Monsoonal rains in the delta regions with high annual rainfall, su
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