Possibly silly question about wasting water

[XemaSab]

It seems to me like if I use say, 25 gallons of water to take a leisurely shower, that 25 gallons goes down the drain and becomes 25 gallons at the sewage plant. They might lose some of it in processing, but I took my 25 gallons and I gave them back 25 gallons.

The thing that it seems like I'm really wasting is electricity for the pumping and treatment.

Tell me how I'm wrong. :P

[gateley]

1. Kick. I'd like to know the answer, too. nt

[DesertFlower]

2. i have long hair so it has to be shampooed

and conditioned, but i don't think i'm leisurely. we have our own well and septic system. so i'd be using electricity to pump water from the well.

[marybourg]

3. Do you know where your treated water goes after it leaves your

sewage treatment plant? Knowing might answer your question.

[XemaSab]

9. Back into the Sacramento River

:D

[marybourg]

10. Well, I guess that's your answer. You don't drink it just as it comes

from the river. It has to be intensively treated to make it potable. Treatment and aeration causes a certain amount of loss. Then there's the power and filtration media to treat it with. And the power needed to make the filtration media and transport it, etc. So it's certainly not just an efficient endless loop.

[msongs]

4. you took 25 gallons out of storage and used it. depending on what kind of storage it was, using that

much more than needed could be wasteful. If the water flow from storage heads out to sea if not used there is no waste, but if water storage was a holding tank/reservoir, taking the excess water out would be wasteful.

at our house we have a bucket in the shower and the 1.5 gallons of water wasted while the water heats up is dumped in the yard, garden, or a bigger tank and used for another purpose if possible.

[eilen]

5. Your very welcome to come to my house

Fill your tanks with the snow from my driveway. You'll be good for at least 6 months. I think we got at least a yard's worth, maybe more in this past week. No water shortage here.

[phantom power]

6. Potable water, like everything else, can be thought of as embodied energy.

:hi:

[Fledermaus]

7. In the South West, we recycle our water.

I wrote a paper on how to use the recycled water system to distribute rainwater.

"Rainwater Harvesting as a Distributed Resource"

All of the large cities in the southwest have recycled water stems. Its something relatively new.

During the past several years our society has learned that recycling paper, aluminum, plastic and other resources is more environmentally responsible than continually looking for new resources.

Today the same principle applies to water. Every day millions of gallons of recycled water are produced at four Water Recycling Centers owned and operated by the San Antonio Water System.

In 1996 the SAWS Board approved a Water Recycling plan that will deliver 35,000 acre feet of this highly treated effluent to commercial and industrial users throughout the city.

Today the program consists of a planned 125-mile pipeline going around the entire city delivering recycled water to customers for non-drinking purposes.

http://www.saws.org/our_water/recycling/

[NNadir]

8. It's an excellent question, but one that you may find disturbing.

It is true that water is continuously recyled. If I recall correctly the water from the Colorado out your way is used something like seven or eight times before it finally goes to sea through the outfall pipes at Dockweiler Beach in LA.

The answer to your question involves the fact that no purification process is 100% efficient. Specifically nitrates, amines and phosphates both from pee and from poop are notoriously difficult to remove quantitatively and so they remain in the dumped water, where they cause eutrophication, sometimes so badly as to kill rivers and lakes.

Grease, both from your skin and the things you wash off, including grease, add another dimension. Their extraction usually involves settling tank with a single separation. But neither phase is totally separate from the other, and in any case, it would be almost certainly be expensive and maybe toxic to do back extractions.

Also chlorination in the purification process increases salinity. (Ozonation would be superior, but is practiced only on a minor scale because of its energy expense.)

Finally some surfactants like nonylphenols are extremely persistant, and likewise some medications and their metabolites that show up in pee and poop.

It is possible to clean water up to a certain standard, but it is effectively way to expensive to make it as clean as rainwater, although truth be told, rain is hardly clean itself.

[XemaSab]

11. I'm not particularly disturbed

There's only one small community and one superfund site up the river from us. Sacramento, OTOH, has to drink my pee. :P

[Name removed]

19. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[struggle4progress]

12. I had a friend who back in the 1970s disconnected the drains from his

sinks, collected the water in buckets, and used it on his gardens. He saved money on water bills that way. It's probably not legal everywhere to do that, but reusing water if possible makes sense. What might not make sense is to purify all water to drinking quality, then pee in it, and dump it in the sewers. The sewers are everybody's catch-all: people flush all manner of material -- greases, pesticides, medicines, trash -- so "treatment" can be complicated, because we're bringing water to potability, then contaminating it again, then re-treating for release

[XemaSab]

13. If I had the skills I would totally rig up a gray water system

Poo is really the only thing that should go right to the treatment plant. Everything else is probably good for the yard. :P

(I mean, yes, you can compost poo and whatnot, but I don't care to. Really. :o )

That being said, we've had serious plumbing problems here for a few years, and a few months ago it occurred to me that maybe we're not using ENOUGH water. Like, if we used more the line would clear itself out. But being a good environmentalist, I feel guilty about even thinking such a thing, even though "wasting" water is a different prospect here than it is in other parts of the state.

(Not to overshare, but the line running to the city main gets clogged, and EVERYTHING floods all over the yard. Groady to the max. :o )

[txlibdem]

27. Clogged sewer line is more likely caused by either roots infiltrating or ground shifting

I recently saw a home improvement show where they had to replace the sewer line that ran from the basement to the street. They hired a plumbing company that shoved a camera down the line and there were roots all through the entire length of the thing. That would cause both leaking and blockage all by itself.

Other areas, like where I live, have expansive clay soil that moves and heaves and shrinks with the varying rain amounts and hotter weather at different times throughout the year. This expansion and contraction causes problems with both water lines and sewer lines. The pipes here have to be redone every few years in certain areas. It seems almost futile to build our sewers and water lines the way we are. This past summer, a main water line valve snapped apart and caused an entire neighborhood to flood. It snapped because the ground had shifted so much that it broke off right at a 90 degree bend that was above ground. The underground part of the pipe had moved 8" or more.

Unless you have disconnected all your sinks, showers and the toilet there is little chance that your plumbing problem is caused by using too little water. There is a small chance that the sewer drain pipe may be too small (it may not even meet code, I've seen contractors do some stupid sh*t to save a penny or two). I'd place my bets on either roots or ground movement.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Second Topic -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
To the larger point about a gray water system, go for it. If you have gutters on your house then you should start with rain water collection. For every 1000 sq ft of roof area, each 1 inch of rain will allow you to collect over 600 gallons of water.

This site has the mathematical calculation for getting the sq footage of your roof (it's larger than your home's listed sq ft):

How Much Water Can You Collect in Rain Barrels During a Rainfall

Believe it or not, for every inch of rain that falls on a catchment area of 1,000 square feet, you can expect to collect approximately 600 gallons of rainwater. Ten inches of rain falling on a 1,000 square foot catchment area will generate about 6,000 gallons of rainwater! That’s right, 6,000 gallons! More than you were expecting?

Your roof catchment area is equal to the total square feet of your house plus the extension of your eaves. You don’t need to consider the angle of your roof, like you would if you were buying roofing material, because rain falls evenly on every part of the roof.

To calculate the square feet of your house’s catchment area, measure the area of the outside walls and then include the overhang of any eaves. For example, let’s say you have an oblong house with outside dimensions of 36 feet by 46 feet. You’ve calculated the overhang of your eaves as 2 feet. So, add the 4 feet of the eaves to each wall length (2 eaves of 2 feet equals an additional 4 feet for each wall) to get the total length of the walls plus the eaves (40 by 50 feet).

Now multiply 40 times 50 (length times width) to get your total roof catchment area.

(36 + 4) x (46 + 4) = 2,000 sq ft (Remember that your numbers will vary, measure for yourself and then do the math)

Your roof catchment area is thus 2,000 square feet.

Since one inch of rainfall provides approximately 600 gallons of water for a 1,000 square foot catchment area, and our theoretical house has a 2,000 square foot catchment area (twice the area), you will multiply 600 gallons by 2.

600 gal x 2 = 1,200 gallons

If you have an average rainfall of say 20 inches per year, you have the potential to collect 24,000 gallons of water in one year. (You can use the following website to get a good idea of the average rainfall in your area: http://countrystudies.us/united-states/weather/) 1,200 gal x 20 inches of rain = 24,000 gal

http://www.rainbarrelguide.com/how-much-water-can-you-collect-in-rain-barrels-during-a-rainfall/

Just as an example, if I take that 2000sq ft roof area (which is about right) and calculate for my area here in Dallas, along with the weather info link, I can calculate how much rain I could collect per month and, with a little math, for the entire year.



Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Avg. High 52° 57° 66° 74° 81° 88° 94° 94° 87° 77° 66° 56°
Avg. Low 30° 34° 44° 54° 61° 68° 72° 71° 65° 54° 44° 34°
Mean 41° 46° 55° 64° 72° 78° 84° 84° 76° 66° 55° 45°
Avg. Precip. 2.0 in 2.7 in 3.4 in 3.9 in 5.6 in 3.7 in 2.4 in 1.8 in 4.4 in 3.7 in 2.8 in 2.5 in

Gallons collected per month
----------------------------
Jan 2,400
Feb 3,240
Mar 4,080
Apr 4,680
May 6,720
Jun 4,440
Jul 2,880
Aug 2,160
Sep 5,280
Oct 4,440
Nov 3,360
Dec 3,000

Annual Total 46,680 gallons

I could reduce my water bill by 46,680 gallons a year! And since my sewer bill is tied to my water consumption I could put the rainwater through a particulate filter for use in flushing toilets and maybe even showers (rainwater is better for showers than most city water anyway!). 46,680 gallons is around 40% of my annual water usage in the years we feel like watering the lawn, it's about double my annual usage if I let the lawn fend for itself. And since most of my water bill goes to watering the landscaping, it makes sense to get as much of that from the rain, for free.

It seems like a good idea but my HOA is hard to deal with so I'm still in paperwork limbo. Just one more reason I wish I'd moved a little farther out in the country, or one of the older neighborhoods with no HOA. 20/20 hindsight is kicking my arse again!

=-=-=-=-=-=-=--==-==--==-==--=-=-=--==-=-=

Gray water from your bathroom sinks can be used to flush the toilets.

WaterSaver Technologies Aqus Uses Sink Greywater for Toilet

by Christine Lepisto, Berlin on 10. 7.06
DESIGN & ARCHITECTURE (bathroom)




The Aqus(TM) is the epitomy of American ingenuity. Bothered from a young age by the tragic waste of water flowing down the sink drain, Mark Sanders repeatedly dreamed of a system to collect that water and reuse it. Dreams led to sketches, which led to the hot-glue gun of home remodeler Matt Ridge, who created a prototype to store the greywater from the sink for reuse when toilet flushing. The idea caught the attention of investors, and won the Vogt Invention and Innovation Fund Award, on its way to its public debut at the American Water Works Association’s 2006 Water Sources Conference and Exposition. Nice to see that the device passed the introduction to professionals before appearing at West Coast Green, presumably to a less technically critical audience. Our own Nick Aster met the WaterSaver folks at West Coast Green, where the brochures for this interesting, potentially D-I-Y, product were walking out faster than they could keep reprinting them.

The Aqua catches the water flowing down your sink drain, filters and disinfects it, and stores it ready for the next toilet flush. It is designed to be easily retrofit into existing fixtures and boasts low maintenance. Gravity and a small electric pump transport the water from the 5.5 gallon (21 L) holding tank installed under the sink. A device in the toilet tank prevents fresh water inflow as long as sufficient water is available in the Aqus to do the job; in case the Aqus runs low, the normal toilet valve for incoming water will serve the demand. Unfortunately, this mechanism is not yet developed to the point where it can work with two-flush systems designed to reduce water use at the toilet. Most TreeHuggers will wrestle with another demon in this system: the disinfection system is chlorine based, relying on three tablets that must be replaced during the annual maintenance and filter cleaning. The disinfection is essential to protect pets drinking the toilet water and probably benefits human health as well. Since most public water systems are chlorinated in the process of ensuring safe drinking water, this is probably a small price to pay to reduce household water discharge to the sewer by 25 - 40%. If you discharge to a septic field or potentially sensitive environments, you should talk to the WaterSaver Technologies experts when making your decision about an Aqus.

The system retails for about $200, and has a lifespan of 10-12 years, with a payback of about 4 years, depending on local water and sewage costs. The Aqus system is patented; the UPC product listing of the International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials and the UL seal of approval are pending. The system has been tested in households in Colorado, Kentucky and New Mexico and proven itself market ready. If used by every household, this could represent a savings of 4.8 billion gallons of water flushed down U.S. toilets each day, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Water. Sanders said WaterSavers also plans to design systems for shower and tub, complete in-home systems, and systems to serve multi-family and other commercial structures. The primary market will be home building professionals, but the company will also sell the units over their website WaterSaver Technologies --http://www.watersavertech.com/.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/10/watersaver_tech.php

New Mexico published some good info on gray water and how to use it safely, a DIYer could rig their own system using the tables on what type of filtration to use, here's an excerpt:

Filtration Food particles, Oil and grease,
Organic matter, Soaps, Suspended
solids, and Turbidity

Flotation Oil and grease

Hydrogen peroxide Bacteria, and Odor

Lime Bacteria, Odor, and Sodium

Settling Foam, Food particles, Hot water,
Organic matter, Oxygen demand,
and Suspended solids

Soil filtration Bacteria, Bleach, Chlorine, Foam,
Food particles, Organic matter, Oxygen
demand, Suspended solids, and Turbidity

http://aces.nmsu.edu/pubs/_m/m-106.html

Here's a low tech solution, modify your toilet to be a sink as well:

Hack a Toilet for free water.

This Instructable is a step by step description of the process of adding a sink to the top of a toilet allowing the use of the clean water before it goes into the bowl.

Motivation
Water is a precious resource and our everyday lives are immersed in consuming it. The average toilet uses excessive amounts of water. This hack allows you to minimize some of that water consumption.

I wanted this instructable to be simple enough that anyone could build it with basic tools and materials. I also tried to be material conscious with this project in that: many of the materials are recycled from other things (sheet wood and copper tubing) or second hand (metal bowl), and that it is put together using screws and friction fittings so when the sink has finished serving its purpose it can easily be taken apart and the parts can be recycled.

Read the step by step instructions (lots of pictures!) http://www.instructables.com/id/Hack-a-Toilet-for-free-water./

Note that it is sometimes spelled "GREYwater" instead:

Greywater

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

...

Greywater is wastewater generated from domestic activities such as laundry, dishwashing, and bathing, which can be recycled on-site for uses such as landscape irrigation and constructed wetlands. Greywater differs from water from the toilets which is designated sewage or blackwater to indicate it contains human waste.

Greywater composes 50–80% of residential wastewater generated from all of the house's sanitation equipment (except toilets).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greywater

Here's a resourced that you might want to check out:
http://www.wateriq.org./apps/wateriq/default.aspx -- Put in your zip code to see pertinent advice for your area

[Nihil]

14. Part of it is due to diversion, part of it to the treatment process.

> I took my 25 gallons and I gave them back 25 gallons.

The place where you took your 25 gallons is different to the place where
you gave it back. Now multiply that out by the number of people doing it
and suddenly you have a major change in water flow.

I don't know the area where you are but it will almost certainly involve
the loss of water from a section of river which will thus impact the
environment along that stretch. Most of the time, this will be quite a
large stretch as - to minimise the energy required for pumping - the route
will normally be set up to keep gravity working with the flow rather than
against it.

Sometimes, the water source is an underground aquifer (a.k.a. "fossil water")
and these days, most are being drained far in excess of their refill rate.
This has an impact on the overlying area, sometimes through changes to the
groundwater patterns (dragging groundwater flows deeper), sometimes even to
the extent of subsidence.

As s4p said upthread: we're bringing water to potability, then contaminating
it again, then re-treating for release. This is "wasted" unless you are actually
drinking the water - as for all other purposes - it doesn't *need* to be that
pure. The purification processes vary (depending on the initial state of the
intake) but will usually require the addition of stabilisers (hence adding the
cost & impact of the preparation of the same) as well as suitable areas of
land in which to perform the operations (settling tanks, holding reservoirs).


Please note that none of the above is intended as a criticism of you or your
luxurious showering as the amount you use (whether regarded as "valid consumption"
or "waste") is still a drop in the bucket (sorry, couldn't resist) compared to the
amount that is truly wasted every day via agricultural & industrial consumption.

:hi:

[Blue Meany]

15. You could set up a "gray water" system...

This connects drains for bathtups and sinks to a storage unit, such as a rainbarrel, which can then be used for watering the lawn or garden. You'll want to use organic, biodegradeable soaps if you do this so that you are not dumping toxins into your soil.

[bananas]

16. She could also set up a "golden shower" system...

This connects drains for bathtups and sinks to a storage unit, such as a rainbarrel, which can then be used for watering the lawn or garden or showeree.
You'll want to use organic, biodegradeable soaps if you do this so that you are not dumping toxins into your soil or showeree.
Or showerette.
Whatever!

[tinrobot]

17. It's the difference between fresh water and salt water.

Typically, we get water from rivers, lakes, and underground aquifers. You pump 25 gallons out of a fresh water source, use it, it goes down the drain and eventually out to sea. Once that 25 gallons of fresh water is in the ocean, it becomes salt water and costs a lot more to recover.

The aquifers, lakes, and rivers do get replenished by rain, but often we take more than mother nature gives back, so our fresh water sources can easily get depleted.

[Fledermaus]

18. If you live in the Los Angeles are, you are drinking recycled water.

What you see in the photo is a civil engineered ground water recharge project. Decades ago, the land was set aside because of its natural permeability. The lakes increase the natural recharge. The depth of the water adds pressure to the bottom level of water and forces it underground.

For over 35 years, in the Montebello Forebay Ground Water Recharge Project, recycled water has been applied to the Rio Hondo spreading grounds to recharge a potable ground water aquifer in south-central Los Angeles County.
http://www.epa.gov/region9/water/recycling/

[kestrel91316]

20. Most of out LA water comes from the Sierras or the Colorado River, but

a goodly percentage comes from groundwater, which is technically recycled (by nature). Actually, ALL water is recycled by nature in the end........

[Fledermaus]

21. Did you see all the roofs? Thats a lot of rainwater. All it needs is minor cleaning.

And it can be used to recharge the aquifer. When rainwaters natural relation ship with aquifers is used it becomes part of a common pool resource.

Rainwater Harvesting can be treated as a common pool resource. A common pool resource has eight well defined design principals. When common pool resources are managed properly, they can be sustainable.

[joshcryer]

22. While all and good, some cities have ordinances against this.

For the simple reason that said rainwater is going into the cities own water system, and will be recycled there.

[Fledermaus]

24. ?????

I don't think so.

[Fledermaus]

25. I'm not sure I understand.

Run off is not treated or captured.

Besides loss of natural resource areas, habitat corridors, and buffers to wetlands and stream, conventional development (right hand graphic) creates large areas of impervious surfaces which prevent the infiltration of rainwater. Under natural (pre-development) conditions (left hand graphic), rain infiltrates through soils and percolates downward to the underlying water table, where it recharges the groundwater. Throughout the more permeable areas of Massachusetts approximately 50% of the annual precipitation infiltrates and recharges. Groundwater serves as drinking water supply and provides base flow to streams and wetlands. This base flow is critical to habitat quality for fish and other aquatic ecosystems. In many areas of eastern Massachusetts, where watersheds have become significantly urbanized with extensive impervious areas, the base flows of streams have been diminished. In some cases, such as the Ipswich River where the stream goes dry, eliminating habitat value. Surface runoff is also increased in urbanized watersheds creating greater peak flows which can cause flooding and channel erosion.
http://www.mass.gov/envir/smart_growth_toolkit/pages/mod-lid.html

[joshcryer]

26. Apologies, I got it exactly backwards:

http://www.google.com/search?&q=rainwater+ordinance

[Dover]

23. Good question. Of course energy is consumed in treating the used water,

And along those same lines it would seem that water that runs into a home's septic system and then into the ground would be an even more direct semi-gray water treatment with no cost.
When water authorities are estimating use, I've wondered why they act as if the water disappears or is no longer available after use when in truth it does go somewhere and much of it is either treated and reused or seeps through the ground to an aquifer or wherever.