Drive past a water tower, and it appears to be a silent, passive giant. But it is the central player in a high-pressure balancing act.
Most municipalities obtain their water from a reservoir or well, purify it at a treatment plant and send it to a pump house that fills one or more elevated tanks. The pumps alone are strong enough to push water throughout a town’s network of pipes, but the system’s pressure–at your sink–would fluctuate as usage rose and fell and could drop too low to reach spigots during high demand. “A water tower acts like a capacitor. It maintains constant pressure on the lines and provides backup supply when demand exceeds pump output,” explains Malcolm Jackson, a general manager for Utility Service Company, Inc., in Perry, Ga., which provides tank services nationwide.
Most municipalities obtain their water from a reservoir or well, purify it at a treatment plant and send it to a pump house that fills one or more elevated tanks. The pumps alone are strong enough to push water throughout a town’s network of pipes, but the system’s pressure–at your sink–would fluctuate as usage rose and fell and could drop too low to reach spigots during high demand. “A water tower acts like a capacitor. It maintains constant pressure on the lines and provides backup supply when demand exceeds pump output,” explains Malcolm Jackson, a general manager for Utility Service Company, Inc., in Perry, Ga., which provides tank services nationwide.
