In order to respond to climatic change, many efforts have been made to reduce harmful gas emissions. According to energy policies, an important goal is the implementation of renewable energy sources, as well as electrical and oil combustion savings through energy conservation. This paper focuses on an extensive review of the technologies developed, so far, for central solar heating systems employing seasonal sensible water storage in artificial large scale basins. Among technologies developed since the late 70s, the use of underground spaces as an energy storage medium-Underground Thermal Energy Storage (UTES)-has been investigated and closely observed in experimental plants in many countries, most of them, as part of government programmes. These projects attempt to optimise technical and economic aspects within an international knowledge exchange; as a result, UTES is becoming a reliable option to save energy through energy conservation. Other alternatives to UTES include large water tanks and gravel-water pits, also called man-made or artificial aquifers. This implies developing this technology by construction and leaving natural aquifers

Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SuDS) constitute an alternative to conventional drainage when managing stormwater in cities, reducing the impact of urbanization by decreasing the amount of runoff generated by a rainfall event. This paper shows the potential benefits of installing different types of SuDS in preventing flooding in comparison with the common urban drainage strategies consisting of sewer networks of manholes and pipes. The impact of these systems on urban water was studied using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), which are useful tools when both delineating catchments and parameterizing the elements that define a stormwater drainage system. Taking these GIS-based data as inputs, a series of rainfall–runoff simulations were run in a real catchment located in the city of Donostia (Northern Spain) using stormwater computer models, in order to compare the flow rates and depths produced by a design storm before and after installing SuDS. The proposed methodology overcomes the lack of precision found in former GIS-based stormwater approaches when dealing with the modeling of highly urbanized catchments, while the results demonstrated the usefulness of these systems in reducing the volume of water generated after a rainfall event and their ability to prevent localized flooding and surcharges along the sewer network.

Pervious pavements are rainwater control systems that filter and store rainwater, reducing runoff formation and the risk of urban flooding. In addition, these sustainable urban drainage systems provide an additional source of water for non-potable use, which implies a cost and energy saving. An experimental 45 place parking lot consisting of five different types of pervious pavements was constructed in a public park in Santander, northern Spain. The purpose of this research is to evaluate and compare the effect of each pervious pavement type on water storage under specific conditions in northern Spain over time. The main results showed that the pervious materials chosen influence the behaviour of pervious pavements for storm-water management. Firstly, pervious surface materials had a greater effect than the geotextile layer. Nevertheless, the differences in terms of storm-water management using the different pervious pavement types tested still need to be confirmed. Clustering techniques showed three different behaviours according to the pervious surface used. Moreover, porous asphalt (PA) and porous concrete (PC) showed the highest correlation (86%), whereas plastic grid pavers (PGC) showed least correlation with the others. The capacity of pervious pavement to manage urban storm-water was demonstrated and this experimental parking area provided an alternative water source supplying enough water to irrigate a public garden for almost an entire month.

Pervious pavements are drainage techniques that improve urban water management in a sustainable manner. An experimental pervious pavement parking area has been constructed in the north of Spain (Santander), with the aim of harvesting good quality rainwater. Forty-five pervious pavement structures have been designed and constructed to measure stored water quantity and quality simultaneously. Ten of these structures are specifically constructed with different geotextile layers for improving water storage within the pavements. Following the confirmation in previous laboratory experiments that the geotextile influenced on water storage, two different geosynthetics (Inbitex and a One Way evaporation control membrane) and control pervious pavements with no geotextile layers were tested in the field. Weather conditions were monitored in order to find correlations with the water storage within the pervious pavement models tested. During one year of monitoring the three different pervious pavement types tested remained at their maximum storage capacity. The heavy rain events which occurred during the experimental period caused evaporation rates within the pervious pavements to be not significant, but allowed the researchers to observe certain trends in the water storage. Temperature was the most closely correlated weather factor with the level of the water stored within the pervious pavements tested.

Temperature performance of different pervious pavements: Rainwater harvesting for energy recovery purposes.