Install Water Saving Faucets and Showerheads
Jun 2nd, 2009 | By Greg Primm | Category: Lead, Low Cost Tips, Water
Something I haven’t done yet in my house is install low-flow faucets and shower heads. To be honest, until I did the research for this post, I wasn’t too worried about it. I knew I was losing too much hot water (and electricity) down the drain, but until I found the following at fypower.org I wasn’t in a great hurry to make the changes I needed to.
Inexpensive and simple-to-install, low-flow showerheads and faucet aerators can reduce home water consumption and water heating costs by as much as 50%.
Simply installing a high-efficiency showerhead and faucet aerator will save about 7,800 gallons of water per year in an average household. An easy-to-install faucet aerator will reduce both the flow rate (from 4 to 7 gpm to 1 to 2.75 gpm) and splashing while increasing areas of coverage. This conserves water and improves faucet performance at the same time. Low-flow heads save more than 12 gallons per shower (a savings of 44% over non-conserving showerheads). Ultra-low-flow heads conserve even more, using only .8 to 1.5 gpm, reducing the average five-minute shower’s water usage from 40 to 7.5 gallons.
I’m going to start this weekend checking my faucets and showerheads to see what improvements I can make.
Photo credit: donwogdo
There are actually low flow faucet aerators that go as low as .5 gallons per minute. Also take into consideration adding a low flow faucet aerator to your kitchen faucet. The kitchen faucet typically will warrant a higher flow rate around 2.2 gallons per minute but that is still considered low flow. There are swivel head spray faucet aerators that are really nice for the kitchen as well. Any hardware store sells these for a few dollars.
My own interest in conserving water came about when I installed a tankless hot water heater. My first objective was to save energy and money, which I am pleased to say, it has done. At the time I didn’t fully understand the tankless concept of heating gallons per minute. Now I have installed low-flow showerheads, which cuts down on the amount of water that needs to be heated. I realize now that I could have saved $$ because low-flow showerheads have reduced the size heater I need.