Converting Rainwater Into Quality Drinking Water

[DummDays]

hello community

I stay on koh chang at the moment - and experience a really heavy rainseason

I just see, that most rainwater simply streams into the sea - what a waste

so the idea of converting rainwater into a quality drinking water came up in my mind

I am asking here in this forum - maybe there is a retired specialist member, who could provide me

some informations and some help to get into this drinking water production

any suggestions and advices from any member are welcome

cheers

[flying]

I lived on rainwater most of my life but not in Thailand.

But...What we did was to filter the water after the pump

& before the house.

Of course the water was collected via rain gutters & kept in

a covered 10k gallon tank. The tank has a foot valve at the inlet.

Then to the sediment filters after pump

One thing to consider is final filtration for drinking may be costly

so you might do as we did & just get reverse osmosis or other types

of drinking water in 5 gallon bottles for drinking.

In Thailand it costs only 50 satang per liter

Then use all of the rain water for everything else.

Bathing, toilets,washing, gardening etc.

[simon43]

At one of my small hotels in Phuket, we collect rainwater from the roof and deposit it into the ground well, from where it is pumped via a sand filter to our guest bathrooms for use in the shower, basin and toilet. This works very well, but I haven't considered if it's feasible to filter it further to obtain potable water, (the low cost of purchasing drinking water negates any further investigations)

Simon

[nev]

We have a Nuvo water filterUV systen works well put rain water in the top filters through and the cleaned water tastes great, think you can buy for a few thousand baht, filter lasts about a year, hope this helps.nev.

[ralphlsasser]

Does anyone know how I can get water tested to make sure it is safe to drink? What government agency I can go to? I've ask many people here (Thai's) and they have no idea. All assistance and coments appreciated.

[billd766]

Our rain water is collected in 2 x 3,000 litre stainless steel tanks.

After that we either put it into 2 litre used milk bottles for use in the kettle or in a 20 litre container to go on the water cooler for drinking.

We don't seem to have any problems though we live way out in the countryside.

We wait for a few adys for the heavy rains to wash the roof clear and when the tabks are full we shut the inlet off and that's what we use year round for 8 years now.

I wouldn't do it in a big city or places like Map Ta Phut.

[bbradsby]

right, particulate fallout from urban pollution and acidic pH should preclude use of rainwater for drinking & cooking purposes without an engineered solution.

to answer the water testing question, this requires independent lab analysis. never ask the government... of course the water is perfectly pure '

[flying]

right, particulate fallout from urban pollution and acidic pH should preclude use of rainwater for drinking & cooking purposes without an engineered solution.

I did forget to mention until I saw your post about PH balancing

I did balance our catchment tank. They sell the little test kits for pool owners

Not because we used the water for drinking or cooking as we did not but...........

If you do not balance & have copper pipes as we did...you will start to see blue-ish green stains in your white bathtub.

That is because it is literally slowly stripping the copper pipes

Edited July 15, 2012 by flying

[crazykopite]

Boil the water and it is good for drinking I am still alive at 61 and have lived all over the world where water was an issue when I first came over I purchased the big btl of water from the local water man within weeks my kettle had lime scale so thought sod this set up a water collecter de-scaled the kettle and to this day never had lime scale from the water I collect from my own source

[cooked]

Does anyone know how I can get water tested to make sure it is safe to drink? What government agency I can go to? I've ask many people here (Thai's) and they have no idea. All assistance and coments appreciated.

I was told that I can get a water analysis and soil analysis at the local agricultural college/university. I haven't tried it yet, maybe to be sure you could take your samples to two different places.

I do know that to do a proper analysis you have to be careful about time of day/day of the week, place and method of sampling, storage and transport of the samples. Try googling 'water samples analysis' . I came up with http://www.gov.pe.ca/photos/original/eef_watersemi.pdf

[gk10002000]

At one of my small hotels in Phuket, we collect rainwater from the roof and deposit it into the ground well, from where it is pumped via a sand filter to our guest bathrooms for use in the shower, basin and toilet. This works very well, but I haven't considered if it's feasible to filter it further to obtain potable water, (the low cost of purchasing drinking water negates any further investigations)

Simon

The problem with trying to use runoff water for "Just" bathing and showering is that when in the shower one DOES injest and inhale the water. Even though it may sound like over protecting, you really should only use potable water.

[TomTao]

I would suggest you get yourself a water filter, one of the better ones, if you dont want to pump through a filter I would suggest a counter top filter that you fill from the top, we use one at home that has a ceramic filter that the manufacturer claims removes 99% of all suspened particles as well as 99% of bacteria, just may need to shop around and do some internet research.