AIR WELLS need information

How much humidity is needed for the air wells?
Are there any do it yourself pland for building them?
Is there anywhere that says how big it needs to be to cvollect "x" amount of water?
Thinking of using one in high fesert in NM and CA.

Not an air well per se but this might be of interest. This is from Phoenix.



The secret is out. We harvest dew and frost at the Garden Pool. It is easy to do. Since we are in an arid climate we have to wait for the air temperature to dip low enough to reach the dew point. This happens for us in wintertime, usually in the form of frost. We have a shiny metal sloped-roof that faces east. When the sun melts the frost in the morning, or if enough dew has formed, it travels down the roof in to the rain gutters. That is what you need. It is really that simple.

It seems that Dew Ponds have worked in some areas...you might check out
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dew_pond
they dicsuss Air Wells there too. ;o)

Thanks a lot for these ocmments.
The area of high desert we were in only
gets LESS than ONE inch of rain a year.
So am not sure how any of these methods would work.
I did find the information valuble. THANKS.

Basically air wells work when the temperature is within a few degrees of the dew point. The piles need to be large enough that the rocks in the inside of the pile are cooler (occaisionally at or below the dew point). So a small pile will work when the temperture/dew point difference is small - larger piles will work when this difference is larger. There are too many variables to put a number to the expected amount of water gained. However, any water gained when your total rainfall is low (and potential evaporation is high) is significant.

Here's a link to a previous discussion on permies.com about air wells:

https://permies.com/t/23408/homestead/Air-collecting-water-air