WATER CONSERVATION ASPECTS OF GREEN BUILDINGS

Abstract

The Earth's surface is filled with water by 71.7%, but only 3% of this water can be used as potable water. In the present days, with the rapid increase in population water conservation has become a major issue. Green buildings are being created around the world to minimize the use of resources, reduce various harmful effects to the ecology and create a clean environment. With the increasing demand for water it has become a necessity to implement water conservation in the design of green buildings. This paper overviews the prioritization of water conservation as one of the important aspects of green buildings to save water. Various water efficient technologies such as water cooling towers and rain water harvesting are being implemented around the world. Countries such as Taiwan and Jordan have taken major steps towards implementing water efficient technologies into their green building designs. They have introduced water conservation index to evaluate the consumption of water and the water saving efficiency of the green buildings. Different rating systems have been introduced to establish the degree of accomplishment of environmental goals of the green buildings. Hence, it has been concluded that by using these water efficient techniques, the precious water can be saved in an economic way so that our future generations don't face the curse of water scarcity.