Undergraduate Thesis - Feasibility of Rainwater Harvesting in Paarden Island

Rainwater harvesting is a relatively old technique of collecting rainwater dating back to ancient times. In the mid-20th Century the construction of large scale dams took place and these structures were able to supply cities with large quantities of water. The idea of rainwater harvesting took a back seat in the development of sourcing new water supplies for cities. For most modern cities in the present day, the locations of suitable dam sites have all been used up and the cities are either trying to find alternative new sources of water or trying to make the current systems more efficient.

 

The City of Cape Town has also used up all of their available dam sites (South African Department of Water Affairs, 2011) and now requires a new sources of freshwater. Unfortunately since rainwater harvesting has not been in the forefront of development of new sources of freshwater supplies, there seems to be a reluctance by engineers and policy makers to implement rainwater harvesting on large scales. Further research is thus required to show that rainwater harvesting systems are able to provide an alternative to supplying freshwater.