Seattle and Other Cities Offer Rebates for Rainwater Collection Systems

Seattle and other cities offer rebates for rainwater collection systemsThe City of Seattle, through Seattle Public Utilities, has been offering incentives in the way of rebates for rainwater collection since 2010. The Rain Wise program promotes rain gardens and cistern use for landscaping to offset storm water runoff. While not available in all areas of Seattle, it is growing in popularity in the Ballard and other areas.This is the first incentive program for rainwater harvesting in Seattle with hopes of expanding its area. Diverting rainwater from the roof to a rain garden or cisterns for irrigation helps reduce demand on the city’s sewer system, which finds itself increasingly overwhelmed, resulting in sewage spills in the Puget Sound.  Read more from Sustainable Seattle.

Other cities in the US are finding this to be a good solution to the increasing demands on their sewer systems and water supplies as well. With the droughts that are being experienced in Texas, the city of San Marcos is offering rebates to homeowners up to $5,000 for installing rainwater catchment systems and commercial buildings up to $2,000.

As demands increase on our centralized water and sewage systems, rainwater collection incentives will become more popular throughout Seattle and other cities in the US.

Ken Blair
A rainwater collection systems designer and consultant, Ken has designed and installed residential and commercial systems, primarily in the northwest United States for more than 10 years and, in 2014, began consulting and managing builds in other states. Ken is an accredited ARCSA Professional Designer / Installer and Life Member, the Northwest Regional ARCSA representative and advisor to its education committee and is available to speak about Rainwater Collection Systems design and builds.

Ken is a United States Navy veteran, having served on active duty during the Vietnam War era.

A career entrepreneur, Ken created a new business focus with a commercial dive company in Hawaii in the mid 1980′s to respond to and clean up oil spills, oil spill equipment training, service and maintenance for the oil co-op service industry. Ken is passionate about having a positive impact on the environment and is also a founding director of BANK-ON-RAIN (2011-2014), whose mission is to create grassroots solutions for rainwater collection for consumption and agriculture in developing areas of the planet.