Water storage system installed at Roomburg Hockey & Tennis Club

No tap, ground and surface water used for irrigation, which makes the Dutch sports park completely self-sufficient in water.

Sportpark Roomburg in Leiden is home to LHC Roomburg (three hockey fields) and TC Roomburg (nine tennis courts). During recent renovations, the facility was equipped with an innovative water buffer, which collects and retains rainwater and sprinkler water, for year-round irrigation.Based on the excellent experiences the club has with their first GreenFields TX Pro Plus field, they opted for two more TX Pro Plus pitches, to complete the renovation.

To irrigate the hockey pitches and tennis courts, the weekly water requirement is 350 cubic metres. To retain this amount of water, creating a storage volume of 1200 cubic meters is adequate. To achieve this, CSC Sport and Newae (outdoor space consultants and engineers) created a storage area directly under one of the fields. The storage area under the field (5800m²) is built with 20 cm high recycled polypropylene crates and is complemented with two water basins directly next to the pitch.

The system is self-regulating: the clubs only need to start the sprinkler system. Once the hockey pitch with water buffer is irrigated, 75 percent of the water returns to the storage area. For the other hockey pitches 10 percent of the water is retrieved. The water quality is guaranteed by filtering the water in the system and constantly monitoring the water temperature; the water temperature cannot exceed 20 degrees Celsius. Furthermore, water meters have been installed and a water sample is taken every three months, to guarantee that the water has the required quality.

The entire water storage facility and hockey fields were constructed by our sister company CSC Sport. André Ceelen of CSC explains: 'The sports park is designed to be self-sufficient in water. The entire sports park can be irrigated with the water storage; tap water is no longer required. The water storage has a high efficiency and recollects water used for sprinkling. In addition, drainage water from the tennis courts and hockey pitches is pumped back into the buffer. Rainwater from both paving and clubhouse is also be drained into a collection pit and into the buffer. During dry periods and with a full buffer, the club can irrigate for about six weeks.

In addition to the water storage facility, LHC Roomburg is equipped with two new GreenFields TX Pro Plus water-based pitches, which complements their first TX Pro Plus pitch. The choice for this product was well considered, Ceelen explains: ‘A characteristic of TX Pro Plus pitches is that they have 1.5 million fibres, so they hold the irrigated water well. Therefore, you only need to irrigate once per match; that's certainly enough.’