Rainwater tanks & rain gardens save money & the environment

Rainwater harvesting is becoming better-known in South Africa as homeowners and businesses realise that water conservation must be embraced in our water scarce country.  Rain water tanks combined with rain gardens can ensure that there is enough water for domestic use as well as irrigation, during water restrictions or water outages.  Rain water tanks and rain gardens save money and the environment too.

One may ask why and how both rainwater tanks and rain gardens should be considered?  Well, depending on the number of water tanks are installed, heavy rainfall almost always results in the rain water tanks overflowing (even when large water tanks, up to 20000 litres are installed!).  The overflow from the water tanks can be directed to a rain garden (see Rainwater harvesting: Rain gardens combine form and function) so that the rainwater remains on the property.

How do rain water tanks and rain gardens help the environment?

Apart from the fact that the home or business will be drawing less water from municipal or other supplies, these activities reduce storm water runoff – which can have severe negative effects on the environment around urban centres.  Urban areas are characterised by hard surfaces that do not allow rainwater to permeate into the soil.  The result is that rainwater from rooftops, roads, yards, etc is channelled to stormwater drains in vast quantities.  All this storm water flows to surrounding water courses in unnaturally high volumes causing stream bank erosion and degradation.  The stormwater also often has pollutants collected from roads, factories and yards (pesticides, oil, fuel, industrial chemicals, etc) which can devastate local aquatic ecosystems.

So rain water tanks and rain gardens are beneficial to the environment.  It is also obvious that rain water tanks will reduce municipal water bills and, in some cases, eliminate water bills altogether!

In South Africa, we recommend water tanks, rainwater tanks, water tank stands and other products made by JoJo Tanks (South Africa).  Click on the links below to view the wide range of JoJo water tanks and other high quality JoJo Tanks products.