TriSports.com Blog » Water

Water

Zachary — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 18:28:38 +0000

Water Harvesting Tank in front of TriSports.com

There is no more precious resource in the desert: Water.

TriSports.com uses an advanced water harvesting system, one of the largest private systems in the U.S., to reclaim the precious desert rainfall into usable water. As a result, less water is pulled from commercial sources reducing our impact on the environment and on the local environmental infrastructure.

Water is channeled from the roof of our headquarters building in Tucson, Arizona into two massive 18,000 gallon storage tanks. The tanks store water for use in a vital irrigation system that sustains all of our irrigation and non-potable water needs, reducing our water consumption significantly.

Our water harvesting system is so advanced it is a City of Tucson Water Harvesting Demonstration Site, an example to other businesses of how to manage the desert’s most precious resource.

Water harvesting is one more part of our commitment to our community and environment, and a huge part of who we are at TriSports.com.

Being a Green Business

Debbie — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 17:03:02 +0000

What does being “green” really mean? It is quite trendy to be green nowadays, so you hear it everywhere, but how do you know if a business you frequent cares about the environment? Here at TriSports.com, Sustainability is number one on our list of Core Values, and it encompasses everything we do, and have been doing, since we began back in 2000. We were just nominated for a contest for “Arizona’s Greenest Workplace Challenge” on Mrs. Green’s World, a local radio show. Given that, I wanted to take a moment and let everyone know what we do to make us a “green” company, and hopefully at the end, you’ll go vote for us every day until the end of the contest on September 30th (and tell all of your friends, too)!

The first things you see upon arriving at TriSports.com are the enormous water harvesting tanks, located at each end of the building. One of the largest systems in Arizona, the tanks hold a combined 36,000 gallons of water (and are currently full)! Water is collected from the roof, both rain and condensate from the evap coolers, and goes to cover the landscaping needs. These tanks are also a City of Tucson Water Harvesting Demonstration Site.

One of our water harvesting tanks

By year end, the tanks will be joined by a 128kW solar array that will cover approximately 90% of the building’s energy usage. Panels will be located on the roof, as well as being constructed as part of two shade structures over the parking lot. This is something we’ve been striving for since we moved into this building and we are super excited to see it come to fruition!

Along with the very visible “green” features that TriSports.com has in place, there are many other programs and processes in place. The employees are all dedicated to lowering their environmental footprint, so ideas come from everyone on what can be done to this end. Some of these efforts include:

Dual light controls in office spaces, along with plenty of natural light, so everyone thinks twice before flipping those switches.
Zoned A/C throughout to ensure that only the spaces being used are being cooled.
Extensive recycling – the recycling container is about 4x larger than the trash container, and it doesn’t stop with paper. We recycle the pallets that bring our shipments to us, the boxes that come in our back door, clothing, shoes, bike parts and more!
Commuter program which encourages employees to bike to work by giving them a credit for every mile they commute, along with contests and awards to make it fun and interactive.
Herman Miller furniture throughout, most of which is made from recycled material and can be recycled after its useful life.
Carpet tiles made from recycled materials, which also make it easy to replace small areas rather than having to entirely re-carpet if something were to damage it.
Greenbox program which gives our customers the option to receive a recycled box and packing material instead of new (about 90% of our customers choose this option).
Shoe collection program which donates collected shoes to a local non-profit for reuse within the Tucson community.
Bike parts are donated to Resource Revival to be re-made into art and awards.

Mel, one of our many employees who commute, parks her bike.

This list could keep going on and on! TriSports.com is able to make all of this a success through a combined effort from all of the staff, and everyone feels passionately about preserving natural resources. It really is a team vision!

Water Harvesting Video – Now it’s official.

Seton — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 23:18:46 +0000

There are a lot of you out in cyber land that keep track of our happenings through various sources. For those of you following the water harvesting thread, it is now official – we have our sign and we just released the official press release last week. Chalk one up to Mother Earth!

Let The Water Harvesting Begin! Update #3

Seton — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 20:58:36 +0000

After nearly 3 months, it is finally time to start harvesting the water from our newly installed Rainwater Harvesting System (see Update #1, and Update #2). Since this was installed during one of two dry seasons, we actually only missed one or two small rain events (hence the whole reason for us installing this system – we live in a DESERT). The last part of this project was connecting the building to the tanks.

Inside look at one of the diverted roof drains.

Outside look at the connected roof drain.

Last week, during our one week of winter here in Tucson, we got almost a little over a foot in each tank (over 4,000 gallons). We are expecting to harvest about 100,000 gallons per year from our roof PLUS an additional unknown amount from our AC condensate and swamp cooler wash out. All of this will be used to irrigate all of our landscaping around the facility.

Water Harvesting Update #2

Seton — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 01:44:37 +0000

Our water harvesting tanks are well on their way to completion (see my original post)! Over the last couple weeks they poured the oversized slabs (taking 16 yards of concrete each) and have started to erect the two 18,000 gallon tanks. The tanks are held together by some 1,200 bolts.

One of the two foundations. The foundations are oversize to accommodate a seating area for our guests (mainly during large group rides).

A completed foundation - forms still up while concrete cures.

The tanks are built from the top down. Here a lift holds up the tank for the final assembly.

Bolts, lots and lots of bolts - over 1,200 per tank.

When this project is complete it will be one of the largest rainwater harvesting systems in the United States….and my Hydrology professors never thought I would use my degree, jeesh.

Harvester of…..Water

Seton — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 21:56:24 +0000

Yes, my small tribute to Metallica. As you may know, or not know, we made the commitment at the end of last year to install a rainwater harvesting system on our building. Fast forward 10 months and our water harvesting system is finally being installed. Being in Tucson, Arizona we don’t exactly get a ton of rain and when we do it usually comes so fast that most of it runs off (Tucson is in the Sonoran Desert – home of the Saguaro cactus – and we have two rainy seasons, February-mid April and July-mid September that combine for a total of 12″ of rainfall per year).

Water Harvesting - future location of one of the 18,000 gallon tanks

In order to better utilize this precious commodity we are installing two 18,000 gallon tanks on our building, which will be used to supply water for our plants and washing the TriSports.com truck and trailer.

Here is a view of the Water Harvesting plans of one of the tanks.

Throughout the year we should be able to harvest a combined total of 100,000+ gallons of rainfall PLUS we have are routing the air conditioner condensation and swamp cooler cycled water (we have auto cleaning swamp coolers) into the system as well.

Here is a scale rendering to give you an idea on the size of these tanks.

Time will tell what we will be able to harvest but we will certainly keep you updated. In addition to this system we have removed quite a bit of concrete from the front of our building to make way for additional plants, vines and trees.

Fresh concrete aggregate to match our building covers the new pipes connecting the tanks.

Tank walls waiting to be assembled on site.