Week Four
After visiting Hillsdale High School, there was so much information to unpack and understand.
Campus Tour:
After visiting Hillsdale High School, there was a lot of information to unpack and understand.
After introducing all of ourselves in person to Dave and JB, they took us inside to look around the Hillsdale High School Campus. One of the first buildings they took us into displayed the solar power installation status and capabilities. The information display showed how much power the system was producing, and how much it was providing to the grid or how much total power the school was drawing from both solar and the grid.
After that, they walked us to the space where the future garden expansion is going to take place. This space is super large, about 10 by 30 yards, and features a small already existing raised bed. This space was recessed compared to the parking lot above it. There is also another potential water collecting source beside the garden. There is a drain for rainwater that slopes down the side of the hill to divert rainwater to the municipal storm drainage system. If possible, we would like to see that spillway of water diverted to collection tanks.
Next, we moved on to the new science building. This was the building in the initial interview that JB expressed interest in collecting rainwater off of the many spouts under the eve. There were many of these spouts all around the building. We found that it was interesting that they were placed in this manner, because when it would rain, the water would shoot out of the sprouts over windows and doors, down onto the balcony and then on to the floor. There were additional traditional roof elements with gutter systems that would be a much easier prime target for rainwater collection, mainly due in part to their location on the building.
Then, we moved to the current garden space. This space featured roofs around the gardens, with existing gutter systems that ran through the edges of the garden bed. This space would have great collection potential because the downspouts are so easily accessible and the tanks could be placed in that space with little travel distance for the collected rainwater.
After the small garden space was examined, we moved on to the main courtyard in the middle of the school. This space was unique, in terms of how the rainwater runoff was managed. The basic principle is that the space is laid out like a rectangular donut; the hole in the middle is where the courtyard is. The water flows through a gutter system, with about ten downspouts redirecting the water into the ground off the roof. It is interesting that these spouts are on the inside courtyard of the structure, rather than the outside. We discussed among ourselves how plausible collecting water from inside this space would be, but we determined that it would be more complex to incorporate, so we will focus on other parts of the building.
The final space we moved to was the front entrance. This space was unique, in that it was the only place on campus where the downspouts were open on the bottom. This presented a unique opportunity to most easily collect water from under these roofs since a system could be easily connected to the existing infrastructure without modifying or cutting pipe.
Thursday all teams meeting:
After the site visit, all teams convened over zoom on Thursday. We discussed what we liked about the school layout, the different locations for collecting rainwater, the challenges around where to put storage tanks, and different ideas on how to build collection systems in different locations on the campus.
We also talked about the recommendations we received from Dr. JAK and Ruby. They recommended that we stay away from the idea of each team creating a component of the rainwater system. We all agreed that that advice was the right way to go. In terms of splitting up the work between all the teams, this is what we agreed to accomplish.
Team One (Our team): We will be focusing on collection from the front entrance of the building and the new science building. The front of the building will use a design that will be able to fit over the pre-existing gutter down spouts on the front of the building.
Team Two: Will focus on the administrative building spillways and the mass storage solution.
Team Three: Will focus on the current garden spaces, and the red roofs over those spaces.
Individual Research:
This weekend, I came up with a preliminary design idea for collection of water at the front entrance. My design note book will be linked below. This design would utilize the existing open gutter downspouts on the front eve of the building. We would like to make it plug and play so there will be no major cutting involved. This simplifies the installation process greatly.
Tuesday Morning Team Meeting:
During our team meeting on Tuesday morning, I shared my design idea with the group. My group members, generally, liked the idea; although, more questions were brought up about how it could be implemented.
Some of these questions included:
Can the Physical Plant Services small vehicles tow the proposed water barrel trailer?
How will the system attach to the gutter?
How much will it cost?
Is PVC Pipe safe for the water to route through?
What is the proposed trailer parking space used for?
There is a door near that space, is there an entrance to something there?
How can the system be cleaned?
Our goal this week is to email these questions to our community partner and PPS, to see if they like the concept and answer our questions about this space. We would also like to start working on the collection system for the New Science Building.
