Future Prospects for Macro Rainwater Harvesting (RWH) Technique in North East Iraq

Countries in Middle East and North Africa (MENA region) are considered as arid and semi-arid areas that are suffering from water scarcity. They are expected to have more water shortages problem due to climatic change. Iraq is located in the Middle East covering an area of 433,970 square kilometers populated by 31 million inhabitants. One of the solutions suggested to overcome water scarcity is Rainwater Harvesting (RWH). In this study Macro rainwater harvesting technique had been tested for future rainfall data that were predicted by two emission scenarios of climatic change (A2 and B2) for the period 2020-2099 at Sulaimaniyah Governorate north east of Iraq. Future volumes of total runoff that might be harvested for different conditions of maximum, average, and minimum future rainfall seasons under both scenarios (A2 and B2) were calculated. The results indicate that the volumes of average harvested runoff will be reduced when average rainfall seasons are considered due to the effect of climatic change on future rainfall. The reduction reached 53.73% and 43.0% when scenarios A2 and B2 are considered respectively.