Water use in houses increases over the summer, which is generally because of the amount of water we use to hold our lawns and gardens. However, it’s during fall that most locations get rainfall. With a rain barrel, you can collect rainwater from your gutter downspout and use it around your home and garden, which means spending less on your water bills.
10 Benefits Of Rain Barrels
Why should you gather rainwater? There are selfish reasons, like saving money, and more humanitarian reasons, like helping the environment. The following are the main benefits for you and the earth – of harvesting rainwater with a rain barrel.
Save Money On Water Bills
Indeed if you’re not one to worry about your environmental impact, you clearly watch about the impact water use has on your wallet. When you collect rainwater, you can use it for household chores similar as:
- Watering the lawn and garden
- Watering inner shops
- Washing your auto
- Cleaning driveways, patios, and other outdoor areas
Mopping Floors
Every gallon of harvested rainwater you use around the house is a gallon you don’t have to pay for. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that a rain barrel saves the average homeowner up to 300 gallons of water each year. That’s 300 gallons that won’t show up on your water bill!
Note Rainwater collects bacteria and other pollutants on its way to your barrel, so it isn’t safe for all uses. Don’t use rain barrel water for drinking, cooking, bathing, or drawing surfaces that come in contact with food.
Conserve Water During Drought
Sick of watching your lawn and shops wither down every summer because of failure-related water restrictions? A rain barrel could be the perfect result. You can use gathered rainwater to wash your field and garden as much as it needs with a guilt-free conscience because you aren’t wasting any water.
And it doesn’t just profit you. Conserving water in this way benefits your whole community by putting lower strain on external water sources. It’s one step in conserving our earth’s limited natural coffers – that’s right, water is a limited resource, and ultimately, we’ll run out.
Reduce Stormwater Runoff
Rainwater harvesting also helps the community and the lesser environment by catching stormwater runoff before it can beget problems.
That’s why too important stormwater runoff is a bad thing
Water pollution As stormwater runoff traverses lawns and roadways, it collects all kinds of pollutants, pesticides, chemical fertilizers, beast feces, etc. The runoff ultimately carries all those pollutants into natural bodies of water, where they can harm aquatic ecosystems and dwindle original water quality.
Storm drain clogs Runoff also collects debris like leaves, sticks, and slush, and also carries them into storm seamsters. The debris can beget clogs, which lead to flooding and stress on the sewer system.
When you catch a portion of that runoff in your rain barrel, there’s a lot of it contaminating water and clogging rain spouts. One barrel on its own might not make a huge impact, but imagine the impact if everyone in your neighborhood started harvesting rainwater.
Prevent Flooding And Soil Erosion
Perhaps you have the contrary problem of failure. Perhaps your area gets too much rain, submerging your yard with billabongs and eroding down your topsoil. A rain barrel can help you, too. All the water you catch from the downspout doesn’t end up in your yard.
When you minimize flooding, you help wet field-related issues similar to damage to your home’s foundation, fungal field conditions, and pests. When you help soil erosion, you keep your soil nutrient-rich and perfect for growing strong, healthy shops.
Provide Clean Water For Plants
Tap water from your Gomorrah or theater sock containing fluoride, mariners, and other unnatural complements that can harm your plants. Since rainwater is all-natural and undressed, it’s better for your soil and your plants. Rainwater from your barrel is just as good as rain from the sky, which keeps all the plants in the wild happy and healthy.
Cut Back On Water Usage For Your Lawn And Garden
Direct runoff refers to the dramatic face runoff of water that cataracts into sewers during stormy and snowy rainfall. In industrialized areas, all the concrete, houses, and other impermeable shells keep the rainwater from soaking into the ground where it lands, as it typically would.
When the water is, rather, submerging into the sewage system, the system can overload, performing in major problems similar to submerging downstream and leakages at original sewage treatment plants. By collecting the rainwater that lands on your roof, you can do your part to minimize these problems.
Help Minimize Direct Runoff
When you get a rain barrel, you can collect runoff during storms and rain, which you can also use on your field and garden, dramatically reducing the quantum of water you use from your home water line during the summer months, and beyond.
Collect Tons Of Water
Still, you may think that having a rain barrel is meaningless because you’ll never get any water If you live in a fairly dry area. Still, it frequently takes lower than an inch of rain to fill an entire rain barrel, depending on the size of your roof.
According to Water Wise, a,000 square foot roof with just an inch of rainfall yields over 600 gallons of water!
How Rain Barrels Work
Rain barrels are simple. Here’s a step-by-step breakdown of how they work:
- Rainwater hits your roof and flows into the gutter, also down the downspout.
- The water transfers to the rain barrel, either directly from the downspout or through a diverter you install.
- The rain barrel fills up over time. utmost rain barrels hold around 40-60 gallons.
- You drain water as you need it from the spigot at the bottom of the barrel. Use the water to fill a pail or watering can, or attach a garden hose or drip irrigation system to the spigot.
- An overflow valve keeps the barrel from overflowing by directing redundant water down from your yard and your home’s foundation. You can connect the overflow valve to a second rain barrel to collect more water.
