Rain Water Systems

02/12/2026

Good information for San Diego homeowners

Rain Water Systems: Rain Collection and Moisture Managment, by Albert Barlow

03/15/2023

https://youtu.be/KM2l7ZzRO8I

This is a review and commentary of an outline of a class I used to teach about water conservation and rainwater harvesting at Cuyamaca College in El Cajon Ca...

06/28/2022

I'm back.
This went dormant because I really wasn't sure what I was doing with my company or where I fit in in San Diego.
Leaders are bleeders, and I was leading this charge 15 years ago trying to talk people into it and it bled me dry.
I realize you got a cater to the market you're in rather than trying to change the market but now the drought is back and it's time to continue what I feel is my obligation to educate people on the right way to do this stuff rain water stuff.
I kind of got to the point where I can't stand doing gutters and so I had to kind of figure out, again what my niche was.

And really what it is is that I am all things rain water.
I was always the first, the most creative and the most viciously aggressive about bringing new products and ideas.
My portfolio is so extensive because I was trying every angle of attack from complicated drainage to crazy ornate artistic systems.
And my goal is eventually just to do consultations and basically be more of a facilitator and educator than a practitioner.

pipes run underground to the tanks

10/22/2021

A walk through of a recent install of a 20,000+ gallon rain harvest system in Valley Center, Ca.

A particular interest is that the roof and rain gutters are the last thing that I look at sometimes when designing a system.
I look at where the landscape drains are going and we're excess water is flowing from surrounding properties.
The only thing that seems to be practical for our society is a fully automated system where rainwater is distributed through an irrigation system, where there is a debris management plan and the overflow of the tanks is directed to drainage or aquifer infiltration.

Now that the drought in California is reaching critical status again I'm going to start offering the systems again and educating people on how to do them themselves.

I fell out of love with them because people don't maintain anything and these are not designed to save money on water, they're designed to have organic water that is independent from the city supply.

08/18/2021

https://www.sdcwa.org/new-partnership-promotes-watersmart-landscapes-and-healthy-watersheds-in-s-d-county/

08/13/2021

This page went quiet for a while because quite honestly I had given up hope on Southern California when it comes to serious water conservation.

It has been my observation that people are really not going to change their lifestyle even if it means that the environment is being destroyed.

The Central valley of California has been under process of decimation for decades now all basically to fund a tropical Paradise in Southern California that makes no sense logistically or logically.

Now, the drought is forcing change.

You can no longer just run your downspout water to the street into the ocean.
The government is now mandating things that people have refused to adopt freely.

And while I am generally a small government person it has been my experience that people will not change their lifestyles even with incentives.
Even at the cost of the environment that they proclaim to love.

Now there are serious rebate monies available for people to do water conservation stuff, and also serious penalties for mismanaging storm water and all of that presents the opportunity that I've been trying to cultivate for 15 years now.

It is with my regret that this opportunity comes in a velvet glove of the fist with government now actually going and issuing citations to people for water running off their property in San Diego.

But the fact is is every single person with grass in Southern California needs to get rid of it.

Every single tropical tree and shrub in Southern California needs to be pulled and composted.

We are at a point where this is no longer some quaint hippie notion that we can all be cool and do water conservation: despite 3 years of above average rainfall in San Diego the entire Western United States is it critical mass when it comes to water.

Now, whether by choice, incentive, or mandate people must deal with the water waste.

Fifty of California’s 58 counties are now in a state of emergency because of the drought, accounting for 42% of the total population.

07/19/2021

Real rebates come to San Diego!.
Homeowners in unincorporated San Diego City areas can receive up to $2,100 for water saving landscape features including up to $5 per foot rebate for Seamless gutters.
The picture shows in a nutshell the old idea they want to do away with which is running the rainwater straight to hardscape surface.

07/07/2021

https://youtu.be/JShTPGpf-0A

French drain and sump pump installation inside a home built into a slope.

04/27/2021

04/25/2020

Ground water drainage in North Park.

The water table is so high when you dig a hole in the ground fills up full of water.

04/11/2020

"Crazy Rainfall Totals, Snow Report: San Diego County | Santee, CA Patch"

The persistent heavy showers led over the morning and afternoon to submerged and debris-blocked roadways in numerous communities.

04/04/2020

Pennies from heaven.

The strange Water Year 2020: very dry north, not so dry south Much of Northern California remains exceptionally dry from a seasonal perspective, while far the far southern part of the state has fared much better. (climatetoolbox.org) In many ways, the present Water Year is a tale of "haves" an