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Map of Greater Melbourne.
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A preliminary analysis of the effectiveness of a rainwater tank rebate scheme for both the Victorian Government and individual householders who participated in the scheme was undertaken, together with a determination of the factors affecting the water savings achieved. Yarra Valley Water provided the data for 4,391 households who received a governm...
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... is the capital city of Victoria, Australia and the major residential, commercial and manufacturing centre for the state. It is the second largest city in Australia and has about 73% of the state's population ( Figure 1). Greater Melbourne experienced the largest growth of any Australian capital city with an increase of 406,600 people between 2007(ABS. ...
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Although urban rain transit (URT) is an attractive alternative mode of daily travel, barriers exist in URT development across the world, in particular, the high cost of construction and operation and relative low rates of URT ridership. Despite these barriers, URT has gained considerable popularity worldwide in recent years; much of this trend is d...
Citations
... Brown et al. [61] pointed out, from the perspective of the Australian experience, that practical structural changes, such as the extensive implementation of rainwater harvesting systems, only occur if they are supported at the institutional and socio-political levels. In this direction, several cities around the world are gradually adopting incentives and regulations for the application of rainwater harvesting systems on a larger scale, such as Barcelona, Spain [62]; Berlin, Germany [63]; Melbourne, Australia [64] and Tucson, USA [65]. ...
Rainwater harvesting is a promising technique for more rational water use. However, its sustainability merits remain a subject of ongoing debate among researchers. Life cycle assessment (LCA), a method employed to measure the environmental impact of varying solutions, is helpful in this regard. Accordingly, this paper delivers an integrative review based on the PRISMA protocol, outlining challenges and potential avenues for the LCA application to rainwater harvesting. The central findings indicate that while residential buildings are most commonly examined, more consensus is needed on a uniform analytical framework. Furthermore, several benefits of rainwater are often not considered in LCA and need further exploration to understand possible synergies for its broader implementation. Finally, LCA integration with a life cycle cost assessment (LCCA) shows exciting results as it may be a more straightforward showcase of the benefits of an integrated assessment. It is concluded that specific details of the LCA of rainwater harvesting may still be simplistic. There is much work to be done in holistic assessments to prove the system’s sustainability.
... PP calculates how many years it takes to retrieve investment costs, and the shorter the payback period, the more liquidity the company can secure. However, there is a disadvantage: the benefits incurred after the recovery period are not considered [57]. ARR divides the annual average profit expected from the investment by the average annual investment and calculates the return based on the accounting-calculated profit. ...
The steel industry has been forced to switch from the traditional blast furnace to the electric arc furnace (EAF) process to reduce carbon emissions. However, EAF still relies entirely on the operators’ proficiency to determine the electrical power input. This study aims to enhance the efficiency of the EAF process by predicting the tap temperature in real time through a data-driven approach and by applying a system that automatically sets the input amount of power to the production site. We developed a tap temperature prediction model (TTPM) with a machine learning (ML)-based support vector regression (SVR) algorithm. The operation data of the stainless EAF, where the actual production work was carried out, were extracted, and the models using six ML algorithms were trained. The model validation results show that the model with an SVR radial basis function (RBF) algorithm resulted in the best performance with a root mean square error (RMSE) of 20.14. The SVR algorithm performed better than the others for features such as noise. As a result of a five-month analysis of the operating performance of the developed TTPM for the stainless EAF, the tap temperature deviation decreased by 17% and the average power consumption decreased by 282 kWh/heat compared with the operation that depended on the operator’s skill. In the results of the economic evaluation of the facility investment, the economic feasibility was found to be sufficient, with an internal rate of return (IRR) of 35.8%. Applying the developed TTPM to the stainless EAF and successfully operating it for ten months verified the system’s reliability. In terms of the increasing proportion of EAF production used to decarbonize the steel industry, it is expected that various studies will be conducted more actively to improve the efficiency of the EAF process in the future. This study contributes to the improvement of steel companies’ manufacturing competitiveness and the carbon neutrality of the steel industry by achieving the energy and production efficiency improvements associated with the EAF process.
... In rural areas, this scheme provides about 63% of residential water (109 billion litres). Indeed, there is a number of factors such as restriction on supply water usage, higher water price and government rebate that have played a critical role for high adoption of RWH in Australia (ABS, 2013;Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014;Alim et al., 2020). However, the reliability of a RWH system in Australia is highly variable from location to location because of the wide variability in climate and rainfall across the continent. ...
... However, there are conflicting arguments regarding which economic measure is the most representative. For example, Gato-Trinidad & Gan (2014) found that PP is easy to understand but does not foresee the benefits from the project after the PP period. According to Cbabuilder (2020), BCR alone is not sufficient to represent cost and benefit clearly, rather, they suggested using both BCR and NPV together. ...
In this study, we have examined the viability of rainwater harvesting system in whole Australia in terms of water savings, reliability and financial viability. Three different cases of water use have been considered: (i) toilet flushing and laundry; (ii) irrigation; and (iii) combination of toilet flushing, laundry and irrigation (combined). The analysis is performed using data from 601 Australian rainfall stations. The results show that the reliability of a rainwater harvesting system is considerably high (80-100%) for 'toilet flushing and laundry' use. For 'com-bined' use, the reliability drops below 50% for most of the continent. We have presented the detail results of spatial distribution of reliability and water savings for a tank size of 7.5 kL. It is found that the benefit cost ratio for rainwater harvesting system over one can be achieved under certain conditions. The findings of this study will be useful in sustainable water resource management in Australia using rainwater harvesting system.
... Recent examples of RSS use in HA or home gardening include Australia's "Water Smart Gardens and Homes Rebate Scheme" rebate scheme, specifically designed to encourage people to install rainwater storage systems (RSS) for household gardens and reduce pressure on the reticulated supply [20]. There have been a number of projects promoting small-scale agriculture and it is also becoming increasingly popular in developing countries [21]. ...
Food and water are at the heart of sustainable development. Roof-harvested rainwater kept in rainwater storage systems (RSS) and used in household agriculture (HA) has the potential to increase yields and supplement household nutrition. Combined systems may contribute to at least eight of the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In this paper, a daily analysis tool, ERain, is used to assess what area of vegetables can be reliably irrigated by roof-harvested rainwater. A socio-economic context is built around an orphanage in the semi-humid region of Nakuru, Kenya. Comparisons are made with the semi-arid region of East Pokot. A 225 kL closed masonry tank and a 1 ML open reservoir with an additional 8 kL/day of recycled water entering are analyzed for various roof sizes. The 225 kL RSS connected to 1000 m2 of roof and irrigating 1000 m2 could increase yields from 1850 to 4200 kg/year in Nakuru. If evaporation was controlled, the 1 ML RSS and recycled water system could support 4000 m2 of land, yielding nearly 20,000 kg/year, which is enough to meet the WHO recommended vegetable dietary requirements of the orphanage. A combination of crops, some for consumption and some for sale, could be grown.
... Although green infrastructure practices like rainwater harvesting require strategic steering from the city level, the decentralized nature of it allows for bottom up involvement from a diversity of non-governmental actors who may contribute to the planning, implementation, and expansion of green infrastructure and rainwater harvesting practices (Li and Bergen, 2018: 131). Rainwater harvesting is being taken up by citizens around the world through both informal bottom-up practices in cities like Tijuana, Mexico or as a result of regulations and subsidies developed to expand rainwater harvesting in cities like Barcelona (Domènecha and Sauríab, 2011), Berlin (Soler et al., 2018), and Melbourne (Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014), or at the national scale in Brazil (da Costa Pacheco et al., 2017). ...
For the first time in history, the global population is more concentrated in urban spaces than in rural areas. Population growth, climate change, and increasing stress on water resources evidence the urgency of adopting more sustainable urban water management practices. Drawing on contributions from the literature on informality, Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Urbanism, and urban rainwater harvesting, we investigate DIY Urbanism as a specific type of informality and as a strategy for citizen action to push local governments to adopt and institutionalize water sustainability initiatives. Taking the city of Tucson, Arizona, a pioneer of arid urban rainwater harvesting practices, as a case study, we examine rainwater harvesting as a proposed sustainable urban water management practice for a water-stressed city with aging infrastructure and a growing population particularly vulnerable to a changing climate. Based on interviews, stakeholder meetings, and document analysis, this paper examines several elements of the rainwater harvesting movement in Tucson that both mesh with and differ from other types of informality. We find that although rainwater harvesting contributes to the vision of an urban utopia for some local activists and NGO actors, for those working within the municipal bureaucracy, it may be viewed as an attack on social order and private resource rights. Despite some loss of autonomy in implementing DIY Urbanism after its institutionalization and emerging maintenance issues, DIY Urbanists in Tucson continue to challenge official authority to remake the city. We caution that the subsequent institutionalization of urban rainwater harvesting should not further institutionalize inequities in access but rather promote greater water democracy in cities.
... Household's perception was not used to measure affordability of an RWH system, but only used as an indication of household willingness to adapt RWH system as a more sustainable water source. This is because even in developed countries, governments provide subsidies to households who install RWH systems ( Gato-Trinidad & Gan, 2014). ...
... High cost was also reported as the reason why some households in Australia did not install RWH systems (Rahman, Keane, & Imteaz, 2012). In Australia, the cost barrier was overcome by adopting a rebate scheme for households willing to install RWH systems ( Gato-Trinidad & Gan, 2014;Rahman et al., 2012). Such a scheme can also be adopted by Indonesian government to enhance the use of RWH system, especially in places where piped water service and shallow groundwater deposit are rare or absent. ...
Rainwater harvesting (RWH) can be considered as a water source especially for remote areas in Indonesia as the country is in the tropics, and has abundant rainfall. This research was aimed at identifying the ability of RWH as a reliable water supply at the domestic level using building cost, water consumption rates and quality as indicators. We built two individual and one communal RWH systems in Cikarang and studied the building costs, monthly water consumption and water quality for the period November 2015-August 2016. The results show that on average, the cost of building an RWH system was approximately IDR 5 million (USD 362) for an individual system and IDR 29 million (USD 2,100) for a communal system. With a 1,050-litre water tank, an individual RWH system could not fulfil an individual household's minimum water requirement, and households must top up water for at least 6 months when rainfall is less plentiful. With 10,200-litre water tank, a communal RWH system should be able to meet minimum water requirements, because it was able to collect about 236 m 3 water in a year, which is close to the 50 litre/person/day requirement for water consumption as a basic human right. The quality of harvested rainwater did not conform to drinking water standards, especially for total coliforms. However, the appearance of the water was clear and taste was adequate such that some households consumed the harvested water after boiling.
... The water demand profile is difficult to quantify (Willis et al., 2013), depending on the number of occupants and their water use habits it merges into a socio-economic issue. Water use for irrigation is probably the most difficult to predict (Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014), with some owners not irrigating at all, others occasionally watering lawns and others maintaining extensive gardens both ornamental and for food production. Plumbing reticulation and pumping costs are one of the main factors that make RWH financially non-viable (Amos et al., 2018). ...
This review investigates the potential of using roof harvested rainwater to support urban agriculture. Among the important issues, we concentrate on system configuration, modelling and economic analysis while comparing research from both developed and developing countries. Urban agriculture contributes notably to food and nutrition in many developing nations, and is receiving increasing attention in developed countries due to a cultural shift towards sustainable living coupled with increasing demand and food prices. Domestic rainwater harvesting (RWH) from rooftops increasingly forms part of integrated water management strategies and has seen a considerable amount of research on modelling and economics, as has water use in agriculture. However domestic RWH usually focuses on in-house usage such as toilet flushing and washing, while there has been very little research specific to its use in food production. In developing countries home gardens often fail due to insufficient rainfall and water supply. In general, promoting urban agriculture and the greening of cities begs the question of whether there is sufficient water available to support it and where additional water will come from. A scoping review following a five step criteria is adopted here to understand the extent to which roof harvested rainwater can be used to support urban agriculture and what are the associated economic implications. In view of the broad scope of the water-food-energy-ecosystem nexus, under which this research fits, this scoping review is deemed better suited (in absence of an ample body of literature) to the synthesis of relevant researches than a systematic review. The major contributions of this review are to highlight the lack of initiatives to utilise harvested rainwater in urban agriculture, to explore the obstacles and to lay a foundation for new areas of research within the sustainable urban development paradigm. Furthermore, the comparison between developed and developing countries helps bring to light cultural, socio-economic and political obstacles to improving sustainability and healthier living in the urban environment. The impact of history and traditions on crop choice, growing methods and consequently water consumption rates are also discussed. This review is particularly relevant to three of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (i.e. Cleaner and Sustainable Cities; Health and Wellbeing and No Hunger). It is found that there is a considerable potential to supply water to urban agriculture using customised roof RWH system designs. For example, one study reports that up to 41% of urban horticulture sites in Rome could be sustained by water harvested from local roofs. Irrigating a small garden (20 m²) with harvested rainwater can increase the yield by about 20% meeting the caloric requirements of a typical Indian household. Further research is needed on the integration of roof rainwater harvesting and urban agriculture to maximise its contribution to food production and sustainability.
... For outdoor tanks, the discounted maintenance cost of TOU (MC u,y ) only includes annual maintenance cost (AMC y ), which may include different activities such as cleaning gutters, checking water quality or removing sediments in tank (Moglia et al., 2014). Previous studies estimating the NPV of tanks have used a fixed operational cost (typically 0.05 AUD/kL) additional to the annual maintenance cost for tanks plumbed to the house (Tam et al., 2010;Khastagir and Jayasuriya, 2011;Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014). However, more recent work has decomposed this operational cost to include energy usage, energy cost and water use from tanks (Gurung et al., 2016). ...
... Furthermore, although the median value for total annual water savings from the model is significantly higher than previous findings, it is similar to an empirical study conducted in a nearby area in Melbourne with 4391 households that have used a rainwater tank rebate during the drought (Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014). By comparing average annual water consumption per household from mains before the installation of tanks of 5 kL and larger with their water consumption after the tank installation, the authors found that the average annual savings was 120.5 kL per household. ...
A promising way to address the growing demand for water supply and improve the liveability of cities is to invest in decentralised multifunctional urban water technologies. However, the adoption of multifunctional water technologies is a complex issue that requires cross-disciplinary approaches. This paper uses an agent-based model that integrates economic and environmental factors to explore and simulate the decision-making and interactions of two types of agents: a regulator and households. The model is applied to evaluate strategies to increase the adoption of rainwater tanks in a suburb of Melbourne, a city that has often suffered from severe droughts. The model was able to replicate the uptake of rainwater tanks by households for 2005–2014, the period known as the ‘Millennium Drought’. Results indicate that using economic instruments alone may have been insufficient to promote the adoption of rainwater tanks, and that water restrictions have had a major impact on the uptake.
... Roebuck et al. (2011) go as far as to state that any research that finds a RWH system can provide a PP should be thoroughly examined, having found that systems in the UK are not likely to present any. However work by Gato-Trinidad and Gan (2014) find that RWH systems in Melbourne Australia can be paid back between 12 and 47 years for householders and 1e12 years for the Victorian Government (who paid a rebate). In Spain Morales- Pinz on et al. (2014) calculated a PP of 5e204 years for apartment scale installations, but for single houses positive results were dependant on a significant increase in water prices (Morales- Pinz on et al., 2015). ...
Rainwater is a naturally occurring potentially clean source of water. There has been an increased interest in rainwater harvesting (RWH) in both developing and developed nations. RWH can alleviate the effects of accelerated urbanisation and improve their water security in the face of uncertain future climate patterns. Australia's management of her millennium drought has proved the effectiveness of RWH systems. Success in Australia is promising for developing countries with inadequate water supply for drinking and sanitation and unreliable centralised water supply systems. However, there is little research on the economic analysis of RWH systems in developing countries. Here we have developed an economic analysis tool, called ERain, to combine daily performance analysis of RWH systems with life cycle cost analysis for use in economic evaluation. ERain has shown that the recent tendency towards smaller tanks in Australia is a poor choice economically, that RWH systems in Kenya can be economically beneficial if installed without reticulation, and that reliability (the percentage of days that the demand is met) can be a financial issue. ERain provides a realistic framework for establishing sustainable RWH solutions. The relationship between the benefit-cost ratio, reliability and efficiency (the percentage of available water used) is discussed as well as discrepancies between the benefit-cost ratio (BCR), and net present value (NPV) as economic indicators. Results highlight the need for innovation and reduction in capital and on-going costs associated with RWH systems in preference to increasing the price of water to increase their economic viability. The impact of paying elevated prices for water purchased from street vendors on the other hand demonstrates the dependency of RWH system economic viability on regional freshwater cost. Results also show that a rebate that matches tank size would be a good initiative to encourage the installation of larger tanks and increase water security, while relying on customer perspective of value will tend towards installation of smaller tanks and a superficial water security.
... There has been a significant increase in the uptake of rainwater tanks in Melbourne stemming from their enthusiastic promotion by the state government of Victoria and water utilities during the Millennium Drought. The Victorian Government also introduced their five-star building regulations in 2005 that required all new homes to have either a solar hot water system or a rainwater tank connected to the toilet (Gato-Trinidad and Gan, 2014). The effect of these two drivers was such that by 2013, 31% of households in metropolitan Melbourne had rainwater tanks (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2013). ...
Rainwater harvesting in residential homes is emerging as an important complement to centralized water supplies in urban centres around the world. Domestic rainwater harvesting systems provide a variety of benefits for water management and contribute to sustainable and integrated urban water management. There are however risks associated with rainwater harvesting that requires appropriate mitigation. One such risk is that systems can become breeding grounds for mosquitoes. This can constitute a significant health risk through the spread of mosquito-borne diseases (i.e. arbovirus and malaria). This paper explores the extent to which mosquitoes breed in rainwater harvesting systems as well as the effectiveness of different risk mitigation actions. Data were sourced from a large-scale domestic rainwater tank inspection survey undertaken in Melbourne and were analysed using simple Bayesian Network models. The observed rate of mosquito breeding was too high and was identified as a serious concern for health officials and water managers. The most common access routes into the tank system were found to be through the tank inlet or overflow. By exploring different system set-ups it was found that in order to mitigate the risk of mosquito breeding in tanks, all potential access routes must be adequately sealed. The complete eradication of mosquitos in rainwater tanks, however,, may need further investigation, as 4% of systems with adequate protection at the inlet and overflow were still found to have mosquitoes in them.
