Drinking water storage ideas.

[Diesel Dan]

Thinking about basically adding a underground "cistern" into my water supply.
This is the first place we've been on municipal water. Don't like the idea of not having a backup water supply. Unfortunately I don't believe having a well drilled is a viable option, ground water quality/supply not good.

One idea is a buried 1,000 gal poly tank that is fed by the water line via float setup. Submersible pump then feeds house. Yes it would add more equipment to the equation but would give weeks worth of reserve.

Anyone done something similar?

 

[ZRX61]

1000 gal isn't much of a back up.

 

[TTMotorsports]

I had a well on my previous house and the main concern for me wasn't water ever it was power. If power died so did the well pump and no power or water any longer.

 

[infinkc]

Issue I see with a tank is if that municipal supply gets contaminated, your tank is also contaminated. A well would be my choice. Or just stock up on some 5 gallon jugs and rotate using them.

 

[MTY]

I have two 2100 gallon cisterns sunk in the yard. They are concrete. One is for the well and one is for the spring. The well feeds the house, and it is controlled by a float valve. The spring cistern is for outside watering, and it has an overflow pipe that runs into an old pond.

The well pump kicks on every few weeks to fill the house cistern, and the spring puts out about 2000 gallons per day. The house is gravity fed, no pumps or pressure tanks are used.

Back up heat is a propane free standing stove that will run without electricity.

The cisterns were about $4800 for both placed in provided holes. I did the dirt work, plumbing and electric. There is right at 30K in the system. This includes an 8" 520' hole, pump, dirt work, electrical and plumbing. I expect it would be several thousand higher if I paid for someone to do the work I did.

5 gallon jugs would be cheaper.

 

[Kaizen]

Good idea to keep emergency water on hand but in the long run just not worth the scale you are talking. Yes you will be inconvenienced a few days but if it’s for a week there will be much bigger issues to worry about.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[lonestardiver]

Good idea to keep emergency water on hand but in the long run just not worth the scale you are talking. Yes you will be inconvenienced a few days but if it’s for a week there will be much bigger issues to worry about.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

All it takes is a tornado in the right place, a hurricane, earthquake, wildfire, etc. The situations happen. It is better to be prepared since given the situation, FEMA and even the local governments may not be able to respond appropriately for several days. No part of this world is safe from natural disasters. Some areas have more exposure to different kinds. The cisterns of water can be used for fighting fires or protecting your property from wildfires. For those in rural areas these can be more practical as in the city you have too many ordnances to work around from some things.

 

[Kaizen]

All it takes is a tornado in the right place, a hurricane, earthquake, wildfire, etc. The situations happen. It is better to be prepared since given the situation, FEMA and even the local governments may not be able to respond appropriately for several days. No part of this world is safe from natural disasters. Some areas have more exposure to different kinds. The cisterns of water can be used for fighting fires or protecting your property from wildfires. For those in rural areas these can be more practical as in the city you have too many ordnances to work around from some things.

Yup agree with most of that. You need a pool and large pump for fire.
In the country with a well 100 percent would have backup.
But in a city I’d be more concerned with treating and maintaining this water then any emergency as described. Runoff is always a problem.
If any of those did happen there is usually a water source where a filter and boil will be good.
If that is not the case in your city I’d have emergency stores for drinking.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[tez929rr]

Good idea to keep emergency water on hand but in the long run just not worth the scale you are talking. Yes you will be inconvenienced a few days but if it’s for a week there will be much bigger issues to worry about.

Not really. 5000 gallons of stored well water is pretty much the norm around here. With proper tank placement you can gravity feed to home plumbing. We just got through this week of power disruptions without ever losing water.

 

[CraigStu]

Good idea to keep emergency water on hand but in the long run just not worth the scale you are talking. Yes you will be inconvenienced a few days but if it’s for a week there will be much bigger issues to worry about.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I disagree. We can live for quite a while w/o food but the life span w/o water is short. In our previous house we had stocked up on maybe 12 of those water jugs that have the small dispenser valve. They were out of the way in a corner of the basement. When we moved I discovered half of them had cracked. Some of those were empty and some still had some H2O in them. They had never been touched in 5 years. Turns out that the plastic degrades and weakens. I am thinking maybe the big round jugs you put upside down in a water fountain might be longer lasting.

 

[Diesel Dan]

1000 gal isn't much of a back up.

Normal month usage runs 2-2200 gallons. So at normal usage almost 2 weeks but minor rationing would stretch it a month. Usage includes watering the animals and does go up in summer with gardening. Also looking at rainwater storage for those..

I had a well on my previous house and the main concern for me wasn't water ever it was power. If power died so did the well pump and no power or water any longer.

Have always had backup power.
Also looking into different options too.

Issue I see with a tank is if that municipal supply gets contaminated, your tank is also contaminated. A well would be my choice. Or just stock up on some 5 gallon jugs and rotate using them.

Contamination could be a issue. We are far enough from the water department it should be caught before reaching us. Also if a earth quake or similar happens you immediately shut the supply off.
Wish we lived over a viable aquifer to tap into for a well.

Good idea to keep emergency water on hand but in the long run just not worth the scale you are talking. Yes you will be inconvenienced a few days but if it’s for a week there will be much bigger issues to worry about.

We already keep gallons of bottled water on hand along with canned/dry goods. Wife loves to can so we rotate through home cooked food often. Just looking at a larger water reserve.

All it takes is a tornado in the right place, a hurricane, earthquake, wildfire, etc. The situations happen. It is better to be prepared since given the situation, FEMA and even the local governments may not be able to respond appropriately for several days. No part of this world is safe from natural disasters. Some areas have more exposure to different kinds. The cisterns of water can be used for fighting fires or protecting your property from wildfires. For those in rural areas these can be more practical as in the city you have too many ordnances to work around from some things.

^^^this
You are the best first responder during a natural disaster.

Now storage tanks.
You can get potable water holding tanks from Menards.
1,000 gallon--$1500
1,500 gallon--$1900
Yes concrete tanks are cheaper but not as easy to work with, or clean.

 

[Diesel Dan]

But in a city I’d be more concerned with treating and maintaining this water then any emergency as described.

We live in the country with plenty of acreage to implement any storage system.

Not really. 5000 gallons of stored well water is pretty much the norm around here. With proper tank placement you can gravity feed to home plumbing. We just got through this week of power disruptions without ever losing water.

Glad too hear.

We can live for quite a while w/o food but the life span w/o water is short.

This ice/snow storm shut down my employer for a week. Luckily we didn't lose power. BUT had it been more freezing rain than sleet power outages could have been severe and long lasting. Sure it would be only a temporary supply but it's easier formulating a longer plan when you are not scrounging for survival.

 

[slowtwitch73]

Those round bottles take up a lot of space. I would sooner use high end camping/military angular jugs.. not much dead space when you pack them tight.

I would have a purifier regardless of water storage situation.. cheap insurance.

Wonder if a backup manual pump could work for a well? Maybe one of those barrel pumps. Everyone has backup power until they don't...

We have streams and rivers nearby and I could pop a half dozen deer out any door of the house at the drop of a dime.

 

[4xdog]

I have a couple of 5-gallon totes for water that could be used to flush/wash and a case of bottled water for drinking if the county water supply were interrupted for a few days or a week.

My longer term plan does double-duty with my camping gear -- an MSR Guardian water purifier, which lives in my go-bag when it's not camping.

 

[rayra]

If the chief concerns are availability & contamination I'd lose the float valve and put a good filter setup on the supply line to the tank and fill it manually, then just treat it as needed, flush it when needed. Float valve is a point of failure, anyway.
Municipal water co won't be happy about such a tank connected to their system, anyway, not without a backwater prevention device.

Lot of prepper forums will have more details / ideas.

 

[MarlynOC]

We had a 6000 gal oak cistern tank on the lighthouse for potable water and an external salt water pump for dirty water use. It was in the basement and filled as needed by a buoy tender when we got 1000 gal of diesel fuel. We only had two persons at a time on the light so the water lasted. The diesel fueled out gennys, our air compressors for the fog horn and out boilers for heat and hot potable water. We treated the water every 3 months for purity.

 

[LeeG]

I live in a city. The municipal water doesn’t taste the best, so we drink filtered water. This fits in with my preparedness tendencies. We keep about a dozen gallon jugs of water (about a weeks supply for drinking and cooking). I keep those filled from the eight 7 gallon aquatainers I keep in the shed. This allows me to keep supplies rotated so if I ever did need it, I know it will be available.

 

[Diesel Dan]

If the chief concerns are availability & contamination I'd lose the float valve and put a good filter setup on the supply line to the tank and fill it manually, then just treat it as needed, flush it when needed. Float valve is a point of failure, anyway.
Municipal water co won't be happy about such a tank connected to their system, anyway, not without a backwater prevention device.

Lot of prepper forums will have more details / ideas.

Back flow preventer is easy.
Idea with the float valve is take the 1500 gal unit, realistically will be max filled to 1400. Have it set to fill at ~1200 gal level so 200 gal of fresh fills and mixes. The inlet wouldn't even have to make contact with the water in the reservoir.

Being sealed, under ground and constant supply of chlorinated water should help keep it from going bad.

 

[pmiranda]

I was shocked to discover our house, built in 1999 does not have a backflow preventer to keep it from contaminating the municipal supply. I never realized it until the city lost pressure and I heard our water heaters draining
So just having that would have been dozens of gallons of usable water.
As it is, we're drinking from the ~10 gallons we happened to have on hand and flushing toilets with melted snow. My shop in the next county over still has water but they also had a low pressure event so we have to boil that water but it's nice to get a hot shower.
If I have a point, it's that drinking water is key, and having a cistern is the difference between camping in your own home and a normal routine. I never thought I'd need significant reserve water in a city of over 1M people but at our next move I'm going to move it up the priority list.

 

[Jazz1]

I’m on city water but there is a well in my yard, its old property. Only ever used the water for gardens. Most the houses on my street had wells 60 years ago, only a couple have not been filled in.

 

[SALIV8]

I have never thought of water storage for municipal systems. They usually have multiple emergency backups and would give a boil order worse case.

On a well, I’d check on installing a manually operated pumper.