Assessing Xeriscaping as a Retrofit Sustainable Water Consumption Approach for a Desert University Campus

Abstract

Assessing water usage associated with urban green infrastructure is crucial for water resource management and sustainable planning of desert campus areas. A public university campus layout in the desert region is considered an urban city subject to urban water consumption (UWC) of significant intensity and extent, even though the urban layout is essential to all campus occupants’ comfort and environmental sustainability needs. Hence, there is a need to reduce its detrimental effects through sustainable methods for campus water content. This study focuses on assessing urban xeriscaping landscape quantities as a practical potential approach to support university campus decision-makers in reducing urban water consumption and preserving the urban campus water content as asset management and life quality. Four selected landscape field experiments were undertaken by adopting xeriscaping landscape design instead of existing conventional urban design at King Faisal University’s (KFU) campus layout, Al-Ahsaa, Eastern Province, Saudi Arabia. The study built a specific practical sustainability retrofit approach in water conservation from conventional to xeriscaping method inside the existing public desert campus area. Applying the study approach framework considering xeriscaping layout design provided sustainability requirements, retrofit approach, and pathway to effective landscape mapping, based on reasonable and accurate quantities of xeriscaping landscape items, to convert the KFU campus layout as a low water consumption campus with an average reduction of 41% water consumption within the remaining campus layout. The results of this study contribute to the water conservation and management in university desert campus and opens the door for other studies on the use of this approach for thermal reduction, economic and environmental benefits beside its value for water reduction.