Under the Water Department’s regulation, when installing the plumbing system for a new house, the water from the Mains goes to the storage tank and the kitchen sinks. From the storage tanks the water is then directed to all other outlets like the bathrooms and toilets. It is from this age old regulation that I think the public got the wrong notion that water from the storage tanks is not suitable for consumption and water from the Mains are safe. This is totally wrong. In fact water from storage tanks that are properly covered and maintained is very much safer than water from our mains.
Stored water is cleaner than the water coming from the mains because all sediments would have settled down to the bottom. The level of chlorine too would have been neutralised a little. It is ridiculous if you think of the situation when there is water rationing. People will start to store water in drums and they presumed that water stored by them manually is fit for consumption while water stored in their storage tanks is not.
There is a solution where you can have uninterrupted water supply in case of water rationing or whatever reasons that have caused your water supply to be disrupted. The only thing you need is 2 check valves or one way valves as some calls it. As the name suggest, these valves only allows water to travel in a single direction. Below is a picture and a simple diagram of how a one way valve works.
ORIGINAL LOOK
To achieve uninterrupted supply, refer to the diagram below. I must add that this is best done during a new installation.
ORIGINAL LAYOUT
MODIFIED LAYOUT
Interconnect the incoming Mains with the supply pipes from the water tanks as indicated in red and place the one way valve as shown. What happens is when there is water coming from the Mains, the water will flow through valve B to the kitchen. The water is prevented from going into the tank by valve B installed along the pipe indicated in red.
When there is a disruption, the pressure from the main pipes drops to almost zero, thereby allowing water from the tank to push through the valve A and make it’s way to your kitchen sink. The water fro your tank is prevented from flowing back to the main pipes and to your neighbor’s house by valve B