In line with its goal of setting a global benchmark in sustainable urban development, Msheireb Properties yesterday announced a site-wide non-potable water system within Msheireb Downtown Doha to reduce consumption by up to 6.5mn litres per day.
Work in progress at the Msheireb Downtown Doha project site
The system will further treat municipality supplied Treated Sewage Effluent (TSE) so it is pure enough to be used in the District Cooling System, which utilises energy efficient evaporative chillers, and for irrigation of the site’s vegetation and for the flushing of all toilets.
“We conducted thorough research into various alternative solutions in terms of setting the highest benchmark for water conservation and treatment,” said Mohamed al-Marri, director-projects, Msheireb Properties.
He expressed confidence that Msheireb have in place the best possible solution which will support the project’s sustainability agenda and meet the needs of residents.
A drip irrigation system and a planting palette that focuses on native and adapted species will ensure an efficient irrigation regime for the project’s landscape.
The irrigation system will reduce evaporative losses and the landscaping will require less water overall.
The non-potable water system within Msheireb Downtown Doha will earn water efficiency credits under the US Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Rating System.
The LEED Rating System recognises the use of non-potable water so achieving higher potable water savings will earn more points. The project will also receive further LEED Points for water efficient fixtures which will reduce potable water consumption up to 30%.
To promote water conservation, Msheireb Properties will also select fixtures across the project for their efficiency. Potable water supply and consumption will be carefully monitored for leaks in the system or over-consumption.
The Msheireb water conservation initiative is highly relevant given that Qatar National Development Strategy (QNDS) 2011-2016 identifies water as being one of Qatar’s most pressing environmental concerns.
The freshwater situation in Qatar is particularly vulnerable due an increase in population from 750,000 to 1.7mn over the last decade and the meagre rainfall.
“The rain received in Qatar mainly between November and March accounts for an annual average of just above 80mm or 80 litres per year per square metre, in contrast to the natural evapo-transpiration rates exceeding 2,000mm,” an expert from a UN agency told Gulf Times recently.
This puts Qatar into a serious deficit and makes the country, with one of the world’s lowest levels of rainfall, increasingly dependent on the costly and energy-intensive thermal desalination of seawater in order to meet the water requirements.
Desalinated seawater accounts for about half the water used in the country, and rapid population growth and urbanisation has tripled consumption since 1995, reaching 312mn cubic metres in 2008.
Qatar’s per capita water use of around 430 litres a day is one of the world’s highest, as revealed recently by Kahramaa president Issa Hilal al-Kuwari.
Though the annual production of desalinated water has more than quadrupled over the past two decades to 2009, production per capita has been declining in recent years even as per capita water use has been rising, leading to rising water stress.
TSE or recycled water, the only water source in surplus, is used mostly in irrigation, accounting for 14% of water use.
The QNDS document has pointed out that TSE can play a significantly larger role in industrial processes, district cooling and watershed management and the Msheireb initiative is a step in this direction.
Though Qatar now reuses about 24% of total freshwater supplies, compared with a 16% average among Gulf states, the country lacks the infrastructure to deliver recycled water to every potential user.
Partly because of this constraint, the supply of recycled water exceeds consumption, leaving about 40% of treated sewage effluent to be dumped into vast septic lagoons, creating problems for nearby communities.
The Msheireb non-potable water system will contribute directly to alleviate this concern by utilising TSE for a variety of purposes within 31-hectare, $5.5bn Msheireb Downtown Doha project which intends to revive the old commercial centre of the city through a new architectural language.