subject: Water Is One Of Our Greatest Resources - Harvesting Rainwater For Home Use [print this page] Out of all the basic things we absolutely need to exist, water is possibly the one we use without too much thought. Turn on the tap and out it comes, clean and cool ready to be used. However, this may not always be the case - an unfortunate side effect of our complex consumer lifestyle. In the Western world we consume an enormous amount of fresh water, a quantity which is perpetually growing and pushing our resources to the breaking point. If every one tried to save water, using rainwater collection systems and additionally practice grey water recycling, the benefit would be massive. There are lots of things we can do to protect this priceless resource, from harvesting natural rainwater to re-processing the water that we routinely send down the drains.
Imagine that your roof is 2500 square feet in area, and then times this by 0.6. When an inch of rain lands on the roof of your home, the outcome is 1500 gallons of rainwater that you could use to water your plants or washing your car, in fact for many things except drinking. Most of the two thousand gallons of clean water used by each individual per day in America gets drained away to the processing plant, where it goes through the complex monitored filtration systems before being pumped back to be used again. The process is expensive and will inevitably be more so in the future. The sad reality is that the huge amount of water we use around the house doesn't need to be that clean! We usually drink a gallon or so a day, but the other water we use could really be a lower grade. Even though some waste water should be cleaned and treated before use, like the primary emptying cycles for the dishwasher and clothes washing machine, later machine cycles are pretty clean.
Grey water recycling can be as simple or as complicated as we like, treating and filtering as needed for various uses. Basic filtering of the soap products using a simple charcoal filter would suffice if the water was used for watering the garden, or cleaning the car, to give just two examples. The next 2 primary uses for water is for drinking, and washing our clothes and bodies. The filter needed to turn waste water into water we can drink could be expensive and not too cost effective, depending how 'eco-warrior' you are, but a basic amount of filtering can make grey water usable for general washing purposes. Of course, recycling water, storing and heating, will involve alteration of the installed waste water arrangement such that water no longer drains back into the main sewer system for processing, but stays in the home for re-use.
