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For three-quarters of a century the Lord Somers Camp, as a non profit organisation has provided youth development and leadership services from its extensive camp facility on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.
Now with the support of an Australian Government Water Fund Community Grant and the assistance of major suppliers of water conservation products the Lord Somers Camp is taking full advantage of conserved rainwater for its non mains water supply needs.
The Somers site which has an area of 3.4 hectares receives an annual rainfall of 750mm. As little as 150mm of runoff will be sufficient to fill two 27,000 litre rainwater tanks saving an estimated 267,000 litres of potable water each year.
Rainwater is now collected off 356 square metres of roof area while the tank capacity will provide an estimated 9,000 toilet flushes.
Two 27,000 litre Bluescope Steel rainwater storage tanks are matched to a Davey RainBank system including automatic controllers, so that flushing of twelve toilets in the accommodation units and and supply of water to washing machines is achieved by using rainwater collected from the building rooftops rather than valuable mains water.
An existing Davey pump has been integrated into the system to allow for watering of the expanded indigenous garden areas surrounding the complex.
The water conservation initiative was officially opened by Greg Hunt MP, the local Federal Member for Flinders and Shadow Minister for the Environment.
The Davey RainBank automatic controllers draws upon the stored rainwater whenever there are adequate resources conserved and reverts to the mains water supply only if the rainwater supply is insufficient.
Davey also supplied, through local Davey Master Dealer, PIPES of Dromana, the water supply pump and installation requirements which include a Davey HM90-13 pump unit, three specialised RainBank units and a master control unit.
Davey Water Products spokesman Max Ekins said that the RainBank controllers are being installed on numerous domestic and institutional building projects where rainwater is being collected to provide an assured supply of water for toilet flushing, laundry needs, wash down and irrigation purposes thereby conserving an equivalent quantity of potable water.