What is the purpose of a water tower?

Question

does it just hold water?

Answer 1

In addition to what every one answered, I would say that water tower used for Air Conditioning and they call it a Cooling Tower, which stores cool energy to increase the chillers efficiency.

Answer 2

Constant water pressure because pressure only depends on the difference in height, but also to supply local legends in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

Answer 3

It gives me a place to relieve myself where I'm gauranteed that a lot of different people will get to taste it.

Answer 4

Yes, water only.

It's a high tower having a large volume storage tank on top.

The level of water (Height) is governed by the pressure in the pipeline at ground level.

Mains water, when at the normal distribution pressure, maintains the water flow and pressure to consumers. It also maintains the tank level on the tower.

Should demand by consumers exceed supply, the mains pressure will fall thereby decreasing availability.

The height of the water in the tower will maintain pressure and availability for quite some time due to the volume in the tank. When demand decreases, the mains supply returns to normal and the tower tank refills to its operating level and the system is back to normal.

The water main supply pumps run continuously.

The tower is only used as a back-up during high demand.

Answer 5

The purpose of the water tower is this.

The water tower is placed at a high point in town. Then water is pumped into the water tower. Now when people need water, the water can flow down from the water tower and into their home. This is better then having a pump send water into your home whenever you need it because if there is a sudden demand for water, the pump might not be able to keep up, but a water tower has a resevoir and no limit on how fast water can be used up until it is empty. And the pump pushing the water into the tower, doesn't need to run all the time.

some bigger buildings have a water tank on the top and it functions as a mini water tower for that building

Answer 6

the answer above and it helps keep a steady pressure and acts as a reservoir

Answer 7

yes, and the height gives the water the pressure it needs for flow to the various homes it serves.

This allows the pumps to run intermittantly to keep the tower full.