Rainfall data used for rainwater harvesting systems: a bibliometric and systematic literature review

Abstract

The demand for water has led to an increase in scarcity events in several urban regions. In an urban context, water consumption in buildings plays an important role and rainwater harvesting is one of the ways that consumption can be reduced. One of the input variables for the dimensioning of rainwater tanks is the pluviometric regime's characteristics in the region where the rainwater harvesting system (RWHS) is to be installed. In this study, a bibliometric and systematic literature review was carried out on the types of rainfall data used in the dimensioning of the elements of RWHS. Worldwide, the most-used data comes from meteorological stations, with a historical series size of 30 years, however, other types of data and different sizes of historical series are also used. From this study, it was possible to synthesise the regions where differentiation data can be collected, as well as their characteristics, enabling the researchers to quickly access the definition of separation data collection parameters.