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Performance assessment of citywide rainwater harvesting strategies in New York City

Dijk, S. van (2018) Performance assessment of citywide rainwater harvesting strategies in New York City.

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Abstract:Many cities, in both developed and developing countries, are seeking solutions for increased freshwater demands, higher flooding frequencies, uncertain precipitation patterns, and aged water infrastructures. Rainwater harvesting (RWH), a traditional and reviving decentralized infrastructure may address many of these problems simultaneously. Yet, the performance of RWH has mostly been examined from the perspective of the individual building owner, without accounting for the wider implications of a large-scale implementation. Here we provide a systematic analysis of the water service, energy use, and economic costs of city-wide application of RWH in New York City (NYC), from the perspectives of the building owner and the city manager, respectively. Distinct RWH systems for the city’s 1.1 million buildings were designed, tailored to the building characteristics based on hourly rainfall data between Jan-01-2000 to April-08-2018. Under various policy scenarios, citywide RWH implementation in NYC can meet 22-40% of the city’s non-potable water demand. Strategic public-private partnership that finances cost-beneficial and cost-effective RWH applications in 83% of all buildings in NYC can meet 22% of the city’s non-potable water demand while halving the costs estimated for a filtration alternative.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:ET: Engineering Technology
Subject:56 civil engineering
Programme:Civil Engineering and Management MSc (60026)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/76776
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