Bulk water provision?

Hiya, I organised the community water delivery last year and looked into the alternatives such as AquaCube. I believe that they were a similar price but local water provider Pure Dartmoor were preferred since they collect and re-use the empty water bottles, so it meshed well with Leave No Trace.

I'd be curious what other options are being considered. I've attached the final costs for water in 2019 below. I thought it would be useful as a comparison to the new infrastructure you are considering,

My new boss is an ex plumber, so I asked for his advice on this.

The TL;DR: We can easily get a tap for each theme camp running from the mains connected tap to past where Crumpet was to have a tap for free camping for not that much money or effort.

All we need to do is buy a bunch of garden hose:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/50m-braided-pvc-hose/5177x

Then a bunch of three way splitters (one for each camp that wants a tap plus free camping):

https://www.screwfix.com/p/claber-main-tube-coupling-t-joints-2-pack/503FY?tc=JC4&ds_kid=92700049581232602&ds_rl=1241687&ds_rl=1245250&ds_rl=1249410&ds_rl=1245250&ds_rl=1247848&gclid=Cj0KCQiA0ZHwBRCRARIsAK0Tr-rVRnZqfp4wGSVFVsoH2ifkrU5WJMSzuKNgtVyXpLdFe62i9tvF9d0aAs-cEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

Then a tap for each one of those:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/outside-tap-with-double-check-valve-15mm-x-/37241?kpid=37241&ds_kid=92700048793290406&ds_rl=1249410&gclid=Cj0KCQiA0ZHwBRCRARIsAK0Tr-oA-X3fDwNak0iCjIDMWFYzOe95FhZGEyJWHR1HjTZ9zAm2YT-ksuYaAvxYEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

I’d suggest putting the free camping tap as far from Crumpet as possible without crossing the road, as vehicles need access to the road.

Jobs a good un’. 

Now, the issue of pressure. I don’t think this will be a significant issue for a number of reasons. The main ones are that camps could be asked to fill water containers from the tap creating a buffer, so slower filling wouldn’t be a big deal. We could even have radios for every tap and a dedicated water radio channel, so we could easily take it in turns to fill up. Maybe even designated times that each of the camps can use the tap. If, somehow, even this wasn’t enough to resolve the issue, then we could invest in a pump:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/salamander-pumps-ct50-xtra-regenerative-twin-shower-pump-1-5bar/20423?tc=JC4&ds_kid=92700020374804208&ds_rl=1241687&ds_rl=1245250&ds_rl=1245725&ds_rl=1247848&ds_rl=1245250&gclid=Cj0KCQiA0ZHwBRCRARIsAK0Tr-qhdWXY-GFRL65PFY5xvqKPYuHNQLq_YWuOI5lOTxm7TqdjQPb0btUaAnqxEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

But frankly, judging by the power of that tap, I think just hose and taps would be enough to get this sorted out.

As Organisational Lead for The Whisper, and Dangerous Arts Lead, I might be stretching myself a bit to take on Water Lead as well, but if nobody else steps up then I can do.

Hi
I ran the Water Project with Ax last year, but won't be doing it again this year.
I've run QGIS on the location and the figures look like this (see attached):
Height between tap and junction of roads at top of hill c 40m (the reservoir will probably be at a similar height)
Distance between both points: c.410m

NB
Garden hose isn't potable, and leaks like buggery at joins
Alex might have something to say about taking his water
x, Martin

Thanks for the feedback Martin, we need to know what can and cannot work. Let's get this right.

I think I should be clear, the reason that I’m suggesting a basic plumbing system, is that surely this HAS to be cheaper, and better for the environment than buying plural thousands of liters of mineral water. Let alone when you include the costs to ship that to site.

So, in response to your post Martin, firstly, it seems that you are right about the height being an issue, I gather I didn't communicate this well to my plumber friend. To counter this, he suggested upgrading to a 3 bar pump like this:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/salamander-pumps-ct-force-30-su-regenerative-single-shower-pump-3-0bar/3949p

Garden hose can leak at its joints, but that depends on what joints we use. However, considering the logistics and additional pressure the system would be under, I think plan B is in order.

For joints that absolutely will not leak we could use Hep20 pipe:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/hep2o-hxx50-15w-push-fit-barrier-coil-pipe-15mm-x-50m/5129f

With joints that are extremely quick to use, and take off:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/hep2o-plastic-push-fit-equal-tees-15mm-10-pack/4500f

Plus tap connectors for these:

https://www.screwfix.com/p/hep2o-push-fit-flexible-monobloc-tap-connectors-15mm-x-m10mm-x-300mm-2-pack/2043f

So numbers time.

That would be £260 for the pump.

Assuming we need to go 305m across (I measured that distance on Google Maps), and 410 - 65 = 345m up (based on Martins diagram) that means we need 460m of pipe minimum (a2+b2=c2).

I’d allow at least 600m of pipe so £85 x 12 = £1020

Plus £27 for a connecter, £8 for a tap connecter and £8 for a tap for each theme camp makes £43 per theme camp.

This is still vastly cheaper than buying mineral water. 

Granted, I would certainly request extra budget for this project. Among other things, this plan notably neglects Desanka,  Welfare and The Point among others (assuming they are in the same places as last year), but including them would be very doable. 

Does anyone have any corrections or feedback regarding my suggestion as it stands now?

I would get someone experienced in large scale supplies to check your maths. To get water up 40 metres you need a 4 bar pump. You also need to account for pipe losses and pressure needed at the outlet, so add at least another bar. With multiple taps there's the possibility that there may be multiple people using the system at the same time so whoever's closest to the tap would get the water at any given time. Bear in mind that this is getting above pressure limits for municipal supplies as high pressure water can be dangerous, so you'd need some mitigation at the bottom of the hill.

You would also want to sterilise the system before each use/year which would be a largish job.

As well as pressure you need to consider flow rate. My back of the envelope calculations show that 60 l/hour would be sufficient to supply everyone with drinking water, but that the tap would almost constantly be in use at this (or at least half the time). However it would take 30 seconds to fill a standard water bottle. 100 l/hour would give enough water to supply all needs (at 5 l/person), but would be drawn constantly and would still take 18 seconds to fill a water bottle. You would also need to factor in leaks. There will be leaks in a system like this, unless you have a team of volunteers monitoring it, much like the electricity team. What is the flow rate of the tap itself? (simple test - time how long it takes to fill a 2 l bottle)

I think you'd need to add an estimate for how much water would be used (600m of 15mm pipe will severely limit the flow rate) before going to Alex with the request.

The tap isn't mains water : it's from a small purification plant intended to serve the main house and near-continuous use may be well beyond its capacity.

So, I just had a very productive discussion with Alex, the land owner, about this idea. He raised two issues which I'd like to feed back to the hive mind here.

Firstly, with pipes being directly exposed to the sun, and the water potentially remaining stagnant there, what, if any, is the probability of legionnaires disease?

Secondly, the only information I have regarding the total amount we are likely to use is 5L per person per day, x500 people, doubled (because it's a fun event). Can anyone contribute a more accurate estimate?

Did you see the costs of the community water delivery that I posted here: https://www.loomio.org/d/W9CHFL4a/bulk-water-provision-/11

As Ax points out, we supplied 5,345L bottled water last year - not all drunk by the end of the festival and split between theme camps and free-campers.

How does the gatehouse get it's water ?

Being near the road, it might be on mains. Or it might be from the pumphouse, in which case we can assume the pumphouse has enough pressure to at least reach that height with enough flow to fill a storage tank.

So an alternative system might be to constantly fill a tank from a tap at the gatehouse and pipe that along the roadway adjacent to the free camping field with perhaps a tap as low as Crumpet. At worst, just take it to the nearest edge of the camping field : it's still a much shorter trip, has no hill and is a huge improvement over shipping bottles.

That requires no pump since it's gravity fed, has less worst-case pressure, and provides water for those with the longest journey, the free campers. The theme camps aren't so far from the pumphouse tap and carrying water is less of a problem - they can more easily share the cost and effort of a rolling container.

I would like to add, on an Access note, that the single tap down by the lake is great, but completely inaccessible to folks with mobility issues. Therefore, any idea involving taps needs to take this into consideration and have a tap on the trackway, or where someone in a wheelchair can access it. Ty!