Sustainable water recycling & reuse on commercial construction site
Pollution from building development sites in the form of sediment, litter and wash-down materials can contribute to reduced water quality, and impact negatively on local rivers, creeks and beaches.
KESAB’s CLEAN SITE program continues to address these issues in collaboration with Zero Waste SA, EPA, major corporate partner, SITA Need A Bin, the Land Management Corporation, ResourceCo, industry associations and training providers.
As a result, the Tagara Group has formed a partnership with KESAB on the Bianco redevelopment project at Gepps Cross. The project ensures to not only recycle discarded materials but to also protect local stormwater systems from any run off as a result of any extensive rain events during the construction process.
The project is currently achieving over 80% recycling and resource recovery figures with concrete, steel, timber, cardboard and plastics all being recycled.
Major Water Sensitive Urban Design principles have been designed by the project’s engineers and introduced into the Bianco development. The project looks to lead the way in protecting local waterways as well as introducing an effective stormwater reuse system.
Highlights of the system include:
- Rainwater is to be collected from roofs and discharged by an overland flow across roadways and paths to swales (open drains) and ponds surrounding the site.
- These are interconnected together and discharge water to a corner of the site for connection to Council’s stormwater drains only when a 1 in 100 year rain event occurs.
- The swales and ponds achieve Council’s requirements for improving water quality and slowing the water through the system thereby minimising the size of the amount of stormwater leaving the site.
- Water is transferred from the final pond by pump transfer to the above ground million litre storage tank. From here water is pumped around the site to each of the buildings to serve toilet flushing water, the Bianco Hire wash down facility and to supplement irrigation demands.
- The Bianco Hire wash bay facility has been designed to include further recycling. This facility takes the water collected in the stormwater system to an above ground storage tank and then re-pumped back into the wash bay facility for reuse.
The partnership between Tagara and KESAB proposes to use the site as a model for university and TAFE students to enable sustainable building practices to be part of main stream design and construction.
For further details on the Bianco project, please contact Tagara Managing Director, Tullio Tagliaferri on 8360 9700 or KESAB’s Clean Site program coordinator, Dick Olesinski on 0413 750681.