Water Project Update

I thought I'd share some of the ideas that I've received for my Water Conservation project this week.

• Dpatel recommends I try the yellow water approach in my toilet, flushing only before I go to bed.
  
  
• Elasticsoul recommends insulating the hot water tank and re-routing grey water (water from sinks and showers) to the garden
  
  
• Dw1ght had a whole list for me:
  
  

  Concentrate on the 5 BIG water uses in the home: Turf, Toilets, Showers, Laundry, Dishwashers!
  1. If you irrigate turf, stop it! (I don't. NS gets enough rain)
  2. Replace toilets with HET models that use less than 1.3 gallons per flush (working on it)
  3. Replace shower heads with 2.0 gallon/per minute heads. Turn off shower flow while lathering hair and body. (working on it, <5 minute showers anyway)
  4. Replace standard 45 gallon/ load clothes washer with new 20 gallon per load model. Only wash full loads. (doing it already)
  5. Do not rinse dishes before loading into dishwasher. Scrape the dishes with a spatula into garbage pail. Do not use garbage disposal. Only wash full loads. (yup - check)
  
  Do all these things and you will reduce water use by more than 35%.

• Finally, my cousin Frank recommended an interesting approach:
  
  

  Just an idea - but with multiple toilets in the house, why not use 2 bottles in one so it goes super low flow and restrict that one to number 1 only - that way - little water and you don't have to let it mellow.

So I thought that was a pretty good idea, but I think I need to come up with a good sign to post above the toilet, or risk some plumbing issues. Any funny ideas? Here are my two:

• Sh*t Happens, but not here.
  
• We're #1! Take your #2 somewhere else.

Post your funny ideas in the comments section!

Finally, here's a list of similar recommendations from Natural Resources Canada. They pretty much say the same thing as Dw1ght, so we're looking in the right direction. Time to go gather some water displacing bottles.

PS: Next week is Green Week at Dalhousie. Here's the line-up of events on the Green Week 2008 Facebook group.