The piezometric towers...

Have you ever wondered what are these strange "mushroom" structures that appear from time to time in the urban landscape?

They are called "piezometric towers" and are part of the water network (aqueduct) with which the water is transported to our homes.

In other words, they are storage tanks (2), positioned at a certain height and supported by a concrete or metal tower, where the water is pumped through a special pump (1), and then falls by gravity and reaches our homes (3). They are therefore used to ensure that the water can come out of the taps in the house with minimal pressure. In fact, the term "piezometric" means: relative to pressure.

The managing body of the aqueduct, the one to whom we pay the water bill, must ensure that the water can come out of the taps in the house with a minimum pressure of 0,5 bar. This minimum pressure must obviously be guaranteed, by law, even on the highest floors of our houses. For this reason, according to the Municipal Building Regulations which establish the maximum number of floors for buildings for the various urban areas, piezometric towers of different heights can be found.

But they all have the same function: to supply water, according to the principle of communicating vessels, to our home taps with adequate pressure. I am convinced that none of us would like to wash in the morning with only a "trickle" of water coming out of the sink tap... especially if we are talking about the bathroom in the attic!

In some cases the pump serving the piezometric tower is the same one that takes the water from the underground aquifer. In practice, the structure becomes at the same time a system of "supply and accumulation".

The case of Trieste (Italy)

Perhaps not all Trieste people are aware of the origin of the water that feeds their city.

This water is taken from the underground aquifer of the Isonzo plain and from the resurgences of the Sardos and Timavo rivers, also with the aid of piezometric towers.

Then the water is conveyed into a large submarine conduit that starts from the “Pescatore” Village, crosses 18 km of the Gulf of Trieste, to finally arrive at the city.

Curiosity

Over the centuries, engineers and architects have tried to design piezometric towers in order to modify their visual impact on the environment, both with "modernization" and "camouflage". The following images are just a few examples:

Please note. Source of some images: web

Editor's note: I deliberately omitted to describe some other functions of the piezometric tower to make the article "within reach" of a wider and not purely technical public.