Low Water Irrigation, Phase II

Low Water Irrigation, Phase II

Project Leads: Megan Maurino, Gary Imazumi, Sara Shirazi

Sponsor: Physical Plant-Campus Services

TGIF Grant: $11,378 Project

Theme: Water Conservation & Efficiency

Project Location

Application Submission

Project Description: The Low Water Irrigation Project will install five new weather stations on campus and will hire a student intern for monitoring and analysis. The weather stations will collect local weather (microclimate) information, recording temperature, humidity, wind, and solar data and adjust irrigation percentages against the base line.

Currently, UC Berkeley’s irrigation system uses 48,685,824gal/year which is 12.2% of the total water used on campus. This is by far the single largest consumer of water on campus, and can be centrally-managed. In effort to conserve water due to the current drought and the UC goal of reducing water consumption by 20% in 2020, the Physical Plant & Campus Services (PPCS), Grounds Services, student interns, and the Campus Landscape Architect plan to complete a project that converts the current irrigation system to more water efficient technology.

Project Goals: 

  1. Install five weather stations in 5 unique microclimates around campus.
  2. Reduce the water used for campus irrigation in 2013 by 20%.
  3. Hire Student Intern to provide part-time job for one year and to foster irrigation field work experience and analysis of water savings.
  4. Create integrative project team of staff and students
  5. Inspire water conservation institutionally.

Final Report

Final Poster