A
Rain Catchment System collects rainwater from either a roof, paved area or runoff. The water is then filtered and stored in an above or below ground tank.
The rainwater can be used for either residential, commercial or landscape use.
A Rain Catchment System can be as simple as a small swail to stop water
flooding off a slope or as technically advanced as a system that catches
rain to supply a structure with water for drinking, sanitation, cooling,
landscaping or agriculture. A Rain Catchment System is designed to most
efficiently collect the rain water that falls on any given structure or
property.
"God must think we're crazy. We let the rain fall off our roofs onto
our soil. It washes the soil away and flows to the bottom of the hill.
We then climb down the hill and carry it back up to drink."
(Ugandan project worker)
The History of Catching Rain
It has not always been this way. Primitive Rain Catchment Systems were invented independently in various parts of the world and on different continents thousands of years ago.
In the Loess plateau of China (Ganzu Province), rainwater wells and jars existed as long as two thousand years ago. In that same time period, historians have found an integrated rainwater management system and runoff that fed agriculture for the Negev desert of Israel and Jordan. In India, raincatchers can be found in 15 different environmental zones. The Mayan people in the Yucatan, Mexico have rich,ancient and traditional rainwater catchment technologies (dating back to the Aztecs and Mayas). South of the city Oxkutzcab on the foot of the Puuc Mountain we can still see the achievements of the Mayas. In the 10th century AD, we can find an integrated agriculture based on rainwater catchment. The people lived on the hillsides and their drinking water was provided by 20 to 45 thousand liters cisterns called Chultuns.
For at least three millennia, people across the world have harvested rainwater for household, livestock and agricultural uses.
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