No abstract

A rainwater harvesting (RWH) system is a method of storing rainwater for future purposes. Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM) has implemented this effort on some of the buildings in Main Campus, Parit Raja. However, this system has the weakness that caused the RWH system to stop from appropriately operated. Some of the RWH components are damaged because the design is not thought of thoroughly in the long term. Furthermore, the Main Campus is highly dependent on the treated water supply that caused a high amount of utility bills. Therefore, this study has highlighted the need to analyse the existing small scale RWH system in UTHM’s Main Campus, identify the suitable tank form for UTHM’s Main Campus’ small scale RWH system, and suggest a small scale RWH system’s design for outdoor purposes in Main Campus UTHM. This study has been carried out by using literature review, interview session and observation. The result shows that the small scale RWH system in UTHM Main Campus has a few strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Cylindrical tank form is chosen to design the university’s small scale RWH system. A modular RWH system with the number of tanks installed based on rainwater catchment area is suggested and named E-SPAH, a concept of RWH system that emphasises efficiency and outdoor usage. Perhaps this study would help future researchers, universities, and contractors guide future small-scale rainwater harvesting systems for outdoor purposes in UTHM’s Main Campus.

Rainwater harvesting is a common practice of storing water in a container before it will be used for other purposes. On a domestic scale, homeowners with a rainwater harvesting system (RWHS) installed in their houses faced challenges to maintain and use the stored water. Therefore, this study aims to identify strengths, weakness, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) of conventional domestic small-scale RWHS. A comprehensive opinion of the conventional domestic RWHS is gathered through a series of semi-structured interview with homeowners in Batu Pahat district. The result indicates the afterthought design of RWHS leads to bigger problems such as difficult to maintain, unknown water quality, hazards for children, fixed and undesirable design. The authors conclude by presenting the results in the form of SWOT analysis and offering some recommendations to mitigate existing problems addressed in this study.