Saving money is a priority for everyone but when it comes to long showers or nice hot baths people sometimes have a hard time giving up comforts that ease the pains of long work days.
There is nothing wrong with relaxing after a hard day with a warm shower but reducing stress can also be found by lowering your water and heating bills. If just one of your faucets has a 1 second drip it can cost you $2 to $3 a month and if it is hot water it can cost you even more.
Most faucets built after 1992 have a 2.5 gallon per minute flow rate and your shower heads are the same. To test the flow of your faucet you can take a plastic bucket and fill it with a gallon of water from a old juice or milk container then mark the 1 gallon mark with a piece of tape or magic marker. Place the bucket under the shower head or faucet and time how long it takes to fill. If it takes less then 20 seconds you do not have a low flow rate faucet.
You can either change out your faucet or shower head or you can adjust the flow valve under the sink to reduce the amount of water feeding the faucet. For Showers you can place a flow restrictor valve between the shower head connection and the flow pipe. Shower restrictor valves cost about $5 and can be found in our store or at a local plumbing supply company.
Aerators and special shower heads can provide you with the same feel and function as a higher flow model and reduce your water consumption. By reducing your hot water supply you can also save money for heating.
Some new aerators can restrict flow to 1 gallon a minute which will reduce your use of water 150% while still providing good function. Aerators can cost as little as $2 and are a good investment.
Hot water is a necessity all year round but more so in winter months. Some shower mix valves do not allow you to restrict hot water alone and they operate with one handle where the cold water comes on first and the more you turn the more hot water comes out. This can be wasteful because if you are willing to use less water in your shower you will need to use a full volume of cold water and mix that with hot water to find a comfortable temperature. Designs like this are suppose to keep us safe from scalding but if you can still get a full flow of hot water only they really don’t provide protection.
If you can you should make sure that the hot and cold water can be adjusted independently if not you have the option of adjusting your feed valves which are often located in your walls or basement crawl space to reduce the flow of water to your shower. You should always test the temperature of your shower and baths to reduce the danger of scalding and remember children and babies need extra care.
Washing Clothes
Washing full loads of clothes is important not just to save water but to save hot water too. If you are filling your washer with warm or hot water but not filling it with clothes you are wasting lots of water. Either reduce the water level to a point where the clothes will still circulate or use a full load when you wash. Often you can split your towels or bedding into your clothes and make a larger load. Remember whites and colors are still important but less so if you are not using bleach and your fabrics are color safe.
A last point is not using hot water when you don’t need it. If you are washing clothes or your hands or whatever and you need to reach for the faucet sometimes we seem to always put it on hot.
When you do that you are using both water and energy to make the water hot. So do your wash in cold water when you can and watch what handle you are reaching for.