How to BEAT a water BAN
From sheep’s wool to hippos in the loo and dry shampoo . . .
THE recent hot weather certainly left us basking in the sun for a few weeks, but it’s also left us parched. Weeks of relentlessly high temperatures, an absence of rain and the increase in demand have led to seriously low water levels in reservoirs, rivers and lakes.
So what are the best ways to save water? Believe it or not, it’s the smallest lifestyle tweaks that can make the biggest difference to our supplies.
Here, MANDY FRANCIS brings you the clever water-saving tips and gadgets that will not only help keep your water supply flowing this summer, but can also knock a significant chunk off your water bill, too . . . FORGET the old water-saving showerheads, which worked by adding air to the stream, resulting in patchy flow. Today’s showerheads are far more high-tech.
The most sophisticated is the new €1,210 Nebia, backed by the CEOs of Apple and Google. It uses up to 70% less water by filtering the stream through a surface that creates millions of tiny droplets.
It is like being caught in waterfall spray, and devotees say it is just as effective as a normal showerhead at washing away soap or shampoo, as well as being gentle on the skin. What’s more, the makers claim it will pay for itself within two years.
Fancy something cheaper? Try the handheld Mibote Ionic Showerhead (currently just €9.65 from amazon.
co.uk, delivery to Ireland costs extra) which promises to improve water pressure and save up to 30% on water usage. WEEKLY WATER SAVING FOR A FAMILY OF FOUR: 315 litres – four baths full. A DISHWASHER will use between 12 and 20 litres of water in every cycle. You can cut your weekly water usage by around 30%, however, by loading your machine more carefully and only switching the machine on when it’s absolutely full.
According to a study, crockery that has had carbohydrates, such as potato, rice and pasta, on it does best if placed in the direct line of the water stream, in the middle of the rack, as the food debris needs lots of spray to come off the plates.
Plates that have had protein, such as cheese, eggs and meat, on them do best with a soak in the chemicals that are released at the start of the cycle, so can sit them at the edges of the washer.
WATER SAVING: 45 litres a week – half-a-bath full. BABIES and toddlers love to splash about in the water – and now there’s an eco-friendly way to wash them without having to fill the entire bath.
The BabyDam (€42.89 including delivery, amazon.com) creates an adjustable barrier in most conventional, straight-sided baths, so you can fill just one end of the bath with water, using half the water you would otherwise.
WATER SAVING: If you wash your baby three times a week, that’s 105 litres – one-and-a-quarter baths full. THE weekend car wash is a familiar ritual – but thirsty work. Some estimates suggest we use up to 250 litres of water to clean a car with a pressure washer. But now you can clean your car without using any water at all.
Meguiar’s G3626 Ultimate Waterless Wash & Wax 26oz spray (€7,
amazon.com, delivery costs extra) magically whisks away dirt and leaves a glossy shine. An even lazier option is ArmorAll Express Wash and Wax Wipes (€11.23, see
www.armorall.eu) which do a sterling job, too. WATER SAVING: 250 litres – three baths full. WASHING your hair in the shower can use up to six litres of water, so why not alternate with a clever towel-off shampoo?
There are a number of reasonably priced products available including Try Zerreau Towel Off Apple shampoo foam (€4.50, boots. ie) or Nilaqua Towel Off Shampoo, (€3, carestore.ie).
Simply massage these into your roots and hair, then rub them away with a towel to remove grime and oil and leave your hair smelling fresh. You’ll feel just as clean as with normal shampoo.
It works a bit like make-up remover by emulsifying grease and grime, making it easier to clean it away from the hair shaft.
WATER SAVING: 24 litres – three generous buckets full. ADDING water-retaining gel to the soil in your plant pots and hanging baskets can reduce the amount of watering your plants will need by up to 75%. Most garden centres offer a selection of different products, or try SwellGel (€17.97 for 1kg, contact swellgel.co.uk for a delivery quote). WATER SAVING: 120 litres – a bath and a half full. ‘GREY water’ – that’s lightly used bath and shower water, or rinse water from laundry collected from the outflow pipe – can be used to water non-edible garden plants and wash cars and windows. However, transporting it in any quantity can be a problem.
That’s where the H2Go water carrier (€9.43, waterirrigation.co.
uk, delivery to Ireland cost extra) comes in. It’s an 80-litre bag (the equivalent of a bath full of water) with a screw cap that fits in a wheelbarrow. It can be filled with fresh or ‘grey’ water, then transported to where it’s needed – much better and more eco-friendly than using a hose! WATER SAVING: 240 litres – three baths full. WATER leaks can often be hard to detect, but can cause result in serious waste. A dripping tap can leach 15 litres of water a day, and a leaky toilet can waste up to 400 litres a day. But now help is at hand with LeakBot (€167.50, leakbot.io), an applinked gadget that takes just a few minutes to set up – you just clip it to the water pipe closest to your stopcock.
Programmed to measure air and water temperatures, it will monitor water leaks and alert you to any it finds via the app.
WATER SAVING: One dripping tap can waste up to 5,500 litres a year so a conservative estimate for a week would be 105 litres – a bath THE average shower uses six to 12 litres of water a minute, while a power shower can expel a more wasteful 13 to 22 litres of water per minute. So when it comes to saving water, the amount of time you spend in the shower is very important. In order to keep an eye on your shower time and substantially cut your water usage, it’s worth investing in a shower timer, such as the smart, ShowerBob Twist fourminute timer (€7.14, smartgreenshop.co.uk, shipping costs are extra).
An ‘egg timer’ that can be attached to bathroom tiles with a suction cup, it’s the ideal way to help the family reduce the average seven-minute shower down to an eco-friendly four minutes. WEEKLY WATER SAVING PER PERSON: From 126 litres (one and a half baths) to 462 litres (five and three-quarter baths) of water a week, depending on shower type. WE often run the shower for 30 seconds to one minute before we get in it to allow the water to warm up. Water-saving experts suggest popping a bucket under the shower while this is happening, so the initial eight litres or so of ‘waste’ water can be used to flush a toilet or water plants. This is much better than simply letting it disappear down the plug hole. WEEKLY WATER SAVING PER PERSON: 56 litres – threequarters of a bath full. IF you don’t have a dual-flush toilet – which automatically cuts water usage – putting a cistern displacement device in your toilet will help to cut the amount of water your loo uses.
The Hippo water saver (€28.38 for a pack of three, including delivery, amazon.co.uk) is an easy-to-install, polyethylene bag that sits in the toilet cistern, under the ballcock. It cuts the amount of water flowing from cistern to bowl in every flush by around 1.2 litres.
Popping a house brick, or a plastic water bottle full of pebbles, in the cistern also works in much the same way. WEEKLY WATER SAVING PER PERSON: 42 litres: half a bath full. DON’T tip away water that has been used to cook pasta, potatoes, eggs or similar.
Once cool, it is ideal for watering plants and can also act as a soil improver, thanks to the nutrients. WEEKLY WATER SAVING: Ten litres – a bucket full.