Sustainability of rainwater harvesting system in terms of water quality.

Water is considered an everlasting free source that can be acquired naturally. Demand for processed supply water is growing higher due to an increasing population. Sustainable use of water could maintain a balance between its demand and supply. Rainwater harvesting (RWH) is the most traditional and sustainable method, which could be easily used for potable and nonpotable purposes both in residential and commercial buildings. This could reduce the pressure on processed supply water which enhances the green living. This paper ensures the sustainability of this system through assessing several water-quality parameters of collected rainwater with respect to allowable limits. A number of parameters were included in the analysis: pH, fecal coliform, total coliform, total dissolved solids, turbidity, NH3-N, lead, BOD5, and so forth. The study reveals that the overall quality of water is quite satisfactory as per Bangladesh standards. RWH system offers sufficient amount of water and energy savings through lower consumption. Moreover, considering the cost for installation and maintenance expenses, the system is effective and economical.

Ensemble averaged surface normal impedance of material using an in-situ technique: preliminary study using boundary element method.

An in-situ measurement technique of a material surface normal impedance is proposed. It includes a concept of "ensemble averaged" surface normal impedance that extends the usage of obtained values to various applications such as architectural acoustics and computational simulations, especially those based on the wave theory. The measurement technique itself is a refinement of a method using a two-microphone technique and environmental anonymous noise, or diffused ambient noise, as proposed by Takahashi et al. [Appl. Acoust. 66, 845-865 (2005)]. Measured impedance can be regarded as time-space averaged normal impedance at the material surface. As a preliminary study using numerical simulations based on the boundary element method, normal incidence and random incidence measurements are compared numerically: results clarify that ensemble averaging is an effective mode of measuring sound absorption characteristics of materials with practical sizes in the lower frequency range of 100-1000 Hz, as confirmed by practical measurements.