Even Rainwater Harvesting is Possible in Desserts

It's pretty hard to imagine that somewhere in the driest part of India, rainwater harvesting is possible. And we're not talking about a few hundred gallons of water per harvest, but 3 million gallons of water per harvest. That's the kind of luxury the ancient Indians created in the harshest part of the planet. And this ingenious architecture was conceived 400 years ago and is still used until today.

It's not a question of where is the best place to harvest rainwater, but rather, how to survive when Mother Nature tests your survival skills.

In this inspiring and fascinating presentation by Anupam Mishra, you'll begin to understand that the modern man needs to learn more from his past in order to move forward. Every method used to produce these efficient megastructures to harvest rainwater is truly innovative and resourceful. Something only an astute engineer would think of. Only when this was 400 years ago, these men were not engineers nor were they architects, but merely villagemen. Every build was well-thought out in terms of functionality and practicality. Even the aesthetics was well-crafted.

Watch the video and see for yourself, the legacy of an architecture that surpassed any modern feat in rainwater harvesting. This is proof that a greener world is absolutely possible if we were to learn from our ancestors and their way of sustainable living.

Sri Aman goes GREEN

I went around the school and spoke to Mrs. Yap Kooi Ngoh who is the Vice Principle of SMKP Sri Aman. She was very helpful and informative despite the fact that the whole school (teachers and students) are preparing for the National Day celebration and activities.

Sri Aman is the first school in the country to use the Building Integrated Photovoltaic solar (BIPV) system, which has the capacity of 4.4kilowatts and capable of powering 3 air conditioners or 25 fans. The school was selected to be the first school in the country because of the strategic location of the school and also the position of the school’s roof.

Photovoltaic system is an application of solar cells for energy by converting sunlight directly into electricity. For Sri Aman, how the whole system works is, the BIPV collects sunlight and convert into electricity and if there are any access energy, (especially after school hours or school holidays) it will be sent to TNB via a cable and at the end, the amount of energy sent back to TNB will be deducted from the school’s monthly electric bills. They are even going to have a meter to measure the amount of power, energy and savings of carbon dioxide from the BIPV system. This is so cool!

Aside from the BIPV system, the school also made a lot of efforts in promoting environment conservation. They do recycling all year long. They have 2 separate waste paper baskets in every class room. The ones with holes are for recycle paper and the ones without holes are for other waste. This is done to encourage and educate the students to recycle and to reduce usage of plastic bags. They do not use plastic bags to line their bins!

They also do rain water harvesting. The water is used in the toilets and also to water the plants. Students and teachers also help to composite the waste from the canteen. They put some soil, throw the vegetable and fruit waste into them, add some yeast and cover with more soils. They

leave it there for a few months and when it’s mature, they sell it back to the students and teachers. These are little young green entrepreneurs in the making man!

SMKP Sri Aman was also one of the participants in the Toyota Eco-Youth competition. For this project, they try to conserve electricity in the teacher’s room by blocking the small little gap on the window so that the air cond from the teacher’s room does not escape. Besides that, they also plant trees surrounding the teacher’s room to reduce the temperature. According to Mrs. Yap, the students diligently measure the temperature when the project was running and the temperature dropped by 1-2 degrees around that area.

The school has a website. You can also check out their current activities here