I just happened upon information on Diffuser Technology. and believe this could be a very important system for people in arid areas or where water is expensive, or hard to get.
Some of the main features of this system are:
> Uses about 1/3 amount of water compared to traditional drip irrigation.
> works with low pressure, gravity fed systems*
> You irrigate the roots and not the top soil, so you have less weed problems. which also translates into
less or no need for herbicides.
I have no idea how much these things cost or if they are made by other companies, below is a link to a pdf manual from one company. I think there is a patent on this tech.
To me, the most attractive part of this is that they work on gravity systems, which means I do not need a big pump, that would easily be swiped by crooks. also in remote areas there is no power available.
www.chahtech.com/doc/en/Buried-Diffuser-English-Report-December2012.pdfAnyone have experience with this?
here is a video on a similar setup, but they use Terracotta pipes embedded into the ground around the trees.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyBU4dtoTuM#One more link to the "draining floater" which looks like a cool "new" low tech way of extracting water from sources, to use for irrigation
www.chahtech.com/doc/en/Draining-Floater-December2012.pdf