Looking for tips to save water and money? In this article we will explore some off-grid solutions and other tips to save water.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the average person in the US uses 82 gallons of water every day, and 70% of this is used indoors. Yet of those 82 gallons, 30 gallons is wasted for a variety of reasons, from leaving the tap on whilst you brush your teeth, to not repairing leaking appliances. The water that we use is precious, and it is essential to the planet that we preserve as much as we can. This means not only considering our water usage in the home, but also finding alternative ways to source our water. Off-grid solutions, such as collecting rainwater, reusing grey water and installing water saving devices are good for your wallet and the planet.
Install a Water Saving Device
The simplest and cheapest tip to save water is to install water saving devices around your house. Some devices such as the aerators by Swedish Altered may save you as much as 80% of the daily water use in the bathrooms and kitchens. Water saving shower heads is another great solution to reduce both water use and energy use from hot water.
Collecting rainwater
Harvesting rainwater is an extremely effective way of obtaining water, particularly for use in ponds and in the garden. Research done by MIT found that even an area as small as 100m2 could provide us with 12,000 liters of water per year. This could easily be water that collected from your roof via a simple drainage system and then be stored directly into water butts.
Before you introduce this water into a garden pond though, you should check for signs of algae. Removing pond algae can be done with plants or barley straw. You can also use a skimmer to remove any surface algae.
Rainwater is not suitable to drink straight away, but it can be treated using purification tablets, or run through a TAPP Water filter. Don’t forget that water will only ever be as clean as the container that you keep it in.
Reuse gray water
Gray water is water that has already been used by your household. Rather than sending this into the sewage system, a lot of it can be reused at home. As long as you don’t use a water softener, then the water from your bath and from doing the dishes can be used for irrigation in the garden. You can also use a laundry water recycler to save the water from your washing machine, which can then be used a second time to wash clothing. This will reduce the amount of water you use washing your clothes by 50%. Considering that the average person uses 16,000 gallons of water a year just on laundry, this is a substantial saving.
Installing a TAPP filter
Every year Americans purchase more than 42 billion liters of bottled water. Water filters don’t necessarily save water but they save in other ways.
Drinking water filtered through a TAPP Water filter is a simple alternative that will save you money – the TAPP filter is 15 times more financially economical than bottled water. You will also be reducing your usage of single use plastic bottles and helping to cut down the demand for production.
Other tips to save water
Other simple tips include taking shorter showers, reusing shower and bath water for plants, installing water saving washing and dishwasher appliances and using native plants in your garden rather than water needy grass.
Conclusion
Saving water is imperative if we are going to move towards living in a more sustainable way. Recycling the water we use at home and using a filter is an easy way to do this and will help in the long term.
Do you have more tips to save water at home? Please submit a comment below and we will add them to the article and credit you.
