Does Water Conservation Save You Money?
I vowed that I'd never give up long soaks in the tub. Then my city flooded.
Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink!
With one water treatment plant ruined and the other dangerously low in reserve, Nashvilians have been asked to cut normal water consumption by half. After all, greasy hair is a small inconvenience when you have friends who've lost everything.
Our family typically spends $35/month for city water and sewage fees, a cost I've never even tried to cut. Maybe an old dog can learn new tricks, I thought, secretly wondering just how long my cheerful attitude could last. 7 Ways To Conserve More Water Than You Even Knew You Were Using offers some radical suggestions for beginners.
Water Conservation Strategies I Should Have Been Doing Anyway:
- Cutting off the tap. How absent-minded have I been? This one's a no-brainer when there's no longer a magical endless supply!
- Rain barrels. I'm kicking myself for not setting up a bigger collection system.
- Wiping, not washing. By spot cleaning instead of tossing straight in the washer, my laundry pile has shrunk to half its usual height. I'm cleaning the toddler's tray with a soapy rag, diner-style.
- Reuse of gray water. After washing up, I've been scooping that water to flush a toilet or keep my plants alive.
Emergency Measures Which Save Water, But Not Money:
- Disposable everything, from paper plates to a case of Costco wipes. While the convenience was thrilling at first, in most cases, the real thing is more effective.
- Bottled beverages instead of filtered tap water. My grocery budget could double if we continued this practice.
- Canned and frozen foods instead of scratch cooking, in order to reduce clean-up.
We'll definitely be making some long-term changes when the crisis is over. Please say a prayer that my city will be renewed from the ground up. Water, neighbors, shelter--a few resources we'll never take for granted again!
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8 Responses to “Does Water Conservation Save You Money?”
May 10th, 2010 at 6:20 am
Your city is in my prayers. Our church, Celebration Church has sent our ‘team’ into Nashville to help. I am glad you and the family are okay, I will keep praying. Blessings Roxie
May 10th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Rough times, but as you say, it does put things in perspective when a friend has lost everything, and you merely have take a sponge bath instead of a luxurious soak.
We lived in a place with water rationing- they literally turned off all our water every other day. We learned to reuse the children’s bathwater for plants and toilet flushing, take sponge baths (a bucket of soapy water and a washcloth and bar of soap, scrub down, then take a bucket of clean water adn a wash cloth and rinse off. Dump both buckets outside by a tree requiring water).
I re-used cooking water for soups and stews and used wipes and the soapy washcloth method for cleaning a whole lot more stuff, and yep, we wore the same clothes a lot longer.
Using an apron helped save me a few laundry washings.
Best wishes for a quick recovery for TN.
May 10th, 2010 at 12:55 pm
So sorry to hear about the floods…. it’s awful, awful, awful
.
I hope that the habits people are being forced to do in this hard time will make some lasting impact… If everyone just used a little less water, electricity and other things the world would run a little smoother.
May 10th, 2010 at 8:55 pm
Nashville is in my prayers! I’m in awe of your upbeat attitude:)
May 12th, 2010 at 5:19 pm
my son and daughter in law live in nolensville which is not far from nashville…just last year the nashville area was dry as a bone with little rain in sight….be a do it yourselfer, and make some water barrels…and collect rainwater. rainwater is great for watering plants/gardens, taking an outdoor shower, washing cars/pets, flushing the toilets etc….and if properly treated or boiled can even be used for drinking water. water is something we all take for granted, but when there is none or it is rationed, we wish we had prepared sooner. trashcans make good rain barrels and are inexpensive compared to the price of a modernday rainbarrel…heck, you could even use those five gallon buckets folks use from restraunts and hardware stores. just set the barrel where it will catch the rain run off and there ya go..water when you need it.
May 12th, 2010 at 6:27 pm
Nashville is definitely in my prayers. This is a great time to think about ways to save water – a flooded city, and the summer gardening season upon us.
I love the idea of using gray water for other uses. But I wonder how safe it is to pour soapy water on plants, especially edible plants. Anyone know what the possible consequences are of introducing those chemicals into the plants and the ground?
May 13th, 2010 at 8:05 am
We looked into it when we lived in Colorado and installed a graywater system- our bathtub/shower drained right out to the garden, just below the ground, and so did our washing machine. We used a natural brand of laundry soap that was listed as safe for gray water use in the garden.
Using water with a few drops of laundry soap is actually a recommended treatment for a number of plant diseases and bug infestations.
You can google it to find soaps and shampoos that you feel comfortable with, and you could also use gray water on decorative plants instead of edible ones. Oh, now I use baking soda on my hair instead of shampoo, so I’d feel even more comfortable doing this.
May 31st, 2010 at 9:31 pm
We had the opposite problem in San Antonio last summer – seemingly endless drought and 60 or more days in excess of 100 degrees. We’ve been collecting the air conditioning condensate water. Last year we just placed a watering can beneath the a/c drain pipe, but we recently purchased a flat-back rainbarrel to collect this water. That 50-gallon barrel was completely full in 5 1/2 days, and our a/c hasn’t even been running much yet! Once we figure out an efficient way to empty the rainbarrel, the water will be used on our landscape.
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