Green Living

Using rain barrels to reduce water use and clean up stormwater runoff

Over the two years I’ve employed my two rain barrels, converted pickle containers (I still get a whiff of “half-sour” every time I take off the lid), I don’t think I’ve turned on my outdoor hose once during growing season. A good Indiana rainstorm will fill those 66-gallon containers in a flash. I plug on my garden hose and give my flowers and vegetable patch a good drink.

The use of rain barrels earns me quite a few green brownie points from my most water-conscious friends: first, because I’m cutting back my household water consumption in a world where potable water is increasingly at risk; second, because I’m reducing storm water runoff, which picks up oils, pollutants, and other toxic substances that make their way into our water systems, lakes, and rivers.

Rain barrels aren’t hard to find these days. Garden centers and big box stores often carry a variety of sizes. Most cost from $100 and up. But the return is worth the investment-cost-free rainwater, the ultimate in recyclable resources.

Rain barrels give the garden hose a rest and cut down on summer water bills

As spring creeps closer, I’m spending more time outside in the garden. I’ve put in the radishes and carrots, beets and Swiss chard, and spinach and lettuce. Soon, it’ll be time to get in the annual herbs, and before you know it, I’ll be planting tomato, pepper, and cucumber seedlings.

But this week, I’m moving my rain barrels outside and into position — at the ends of my gutter downspouts. That way, I’ll capture all that spring rainwater that falls in April and May, and — as I have the past three years — dramatically reduce my water consumption and water bill.

My rain barrels are recycled pickle containers retrofitted to collect and dispense water. But now I’m finding that almost all garden shops sell them. You can even find them on WalMart, Target, and Home Depot Web sites.

I’ve been advised, however, to use the captured rainwater only on flowers, lawn, and nonedible growth: The water may contain chemicals from the asphalt roof and other pollutants that you don’t want to eat along with your salad caprese at the end of summer.

Paying tribute to a threatened resource

Today is World Water Day. I’m observing it by not taking a shower. I watered my just-planted radishes and carrots with a tub of used dishwater.

But the best way to honor World Water Day is to recognize water for what it is — a life-giving resource that is under threat. Yes, 70 percent of the planet is covered with water, but only a small percentage is drinkable. And that supply is drying up as world population grows and climate phenomena such as severe drought swath the world.

I’ve ranted in previous blogs about water waste through showering, flushing, and treating your faucet like a fountain. It’s easy to forget how precious water is — I read that the average American uses up to 300 gallons a day. Yet 1.2 billion people around the globe don’t have access to potable water.

It’s ironic that we treat water so disrespectfully, yet we’re willing to pay a premium for it when it comes in a plastic bottle.

A household brand has rolled out with a product that speaks to the current economy: Now that we can’t afford to replace our clothing as frequently, they’re pitching a laundry detergent that helps fabrics last longer. It contains some sort protective agent, but it costs more than most regular detergents. I guess they figure if you’re spending less on clothes, you have more money for detergent.

There’s a better way to get your clothes to last longer-and it doesn’t cost a penny more. In fact, it not only saves time and money, it reduces energy and water consumption and the use of petroleum-based detergent products. Here are some tips:

1.      Stop washing all clothes after one wearing. Your jeans saw only three hours of action this weekend at the movies? Unless you spilled popcorn butter all over yourself, keep them out of the laundry hamper.

2.      Hang up recently worn items in a place where they can “breathe.” A couple hours turned inside-out in an open area (or outside) will air out that “worn” odor.

3.      When you wash, use cold water. It’s the hot water that weakens fibers and robs clothing of color.

4.      Skip bleach and detergents that contain bleach. Sure, it’s harsh on dirt — but it’s also harsh on fabric.

5.      Skip the dryer whenever possible. Hang clothes on a line indoors or, when the weather cooperates, under the bacteria-killing powers of the sun.

For home cleaning tips on everything from clothing to closets, check out Green Cleaning for Dummies.

The “perfect” lawn is anything but green

“How dumb is that?” is a game we played during dinner last week at Bill’s house. We took turns pointing out some of the craziest, most unsustainable practices we’ve observed.  Like packaging prunes in individual wrappers. Buying water in bottles at prices that make gasoline look like a bargain. Designing our communities for cars rather than people.

But one topic set us off on a riff of escalating outrage: the American lawn. Neal speculated that shaking off the ideal of the immaculate grass lawn could take a huge bite out of energy use, water abuse, toxic refuse, and landfill bloat.

It made me think: We plant something that has no nutritional or medicinal value (unlike clover or dandelions) and calls for constant vigilance. We put down petroleum-based poisons to kill everything around it. We spread more chemical-based fertilizers to stimulate fast growth and divert vast amounts of water to keep it green — so we can cut it short with a gas mower: in high season, as much as twice a week. Then when a free compostable material (leaves) covers the ground in fall, we power up the leaf-blower, gather them up in plastic nondegradable bags and send them off to a landfill.

Really, how dumb is that?

Which method of cleaning your dishes is better for the environment? This was the debate the other evening when I joined some friends for dinner. We didn’t resolve the argument, but I’ve checked around since and it appears that using an electric dishwasher may have an edge over old-fashioned hands-in-the-suds washing.

An Energy Star-rated dishwasher manufactured after 1993 likely uses less water than hand-washing-because it doesn’t waste water in that waiting-to-get-warm process you go through at the sink, and because it cleans a lot more effectively, which means you don’t have to pre-rinse to get all food remains off. To maximize efficiency, however, you want to wash full loads and use the most energy-efficient settings (choose air-dry and steer clear of heat-dry, rinse-hold, or pre-rinse options).

            All well and good, but I remain a hand-washer and here’s why: I live by myself. And unless I have friends or family over, it could take me a week to come up with a single dishwasher load. So I wash mindfully. Once a day, I fill up a soapy sink tub about halfway-just enough hot water to submerge or dunk most dishware. I wash and place my soapy-clean dishes in the other sink. When I’m done, I take my spray hose and rinse them. In the summer, I save the tub water to pour on my garden. (Why not? The soap is vegetable-based-the same as those organic bug-deterrent sprays.)

My clothes washer will be replaced with a high-efficiency frontload machine-as soon as I can afford one. Meantime, I’ve switched to cold water for all my wash loads. And I hang my clothes to dry-indoors in the winter and outside in warm weather.

But I’m still uncomfortable about laundry detergent. The greenest solution, it seems, is making your own. But I draw the line at shaving soap, which is part of the homemade recipe. My compromise for the time being is to buy a trusted Earth-friendly brand. (How can you tell if it’s Earth-friendly? More on that at another time.) And I choose dry powder rather than liquid.

Here’s my logic: Liquid detergent-of course-contains mostly water. It seems absurd to weigh down the cleaning agents with water when you’re inevitably adding it when you turn on the washing machine. And there’s a significant energy cost to shipping that heavy jug from the manufacturer to my neighborhood supermarket. Although I know that the powder version travels, too, I can rationalize that it doesn’t include a redundant ingredient.

The other reason I choose powder: It comes in a cardboard box - which I can drop off for recycling at a number of locations. The petroleum-based plastic bottles, on the other hand, are more of a challenge to recycle, especially if they’re not the most commonly recycled plastics #1 and #2.

How to become flush with water saving

Let me tell you about my toilet. When my old one started leaking into the crawlspace, I was forced to replace it. As I researched my options, I discovered just how much water I was using with every flush: Toilets (like mine) manufactured before 1993 use an average of 3.5 gallons per flush (gpf)—and as much as 7 gpf! I also learned that the toilet consumes as much as 26 percent of total home water usage.

Post-1992 toilets use a mere 1.6 gpf, which meant I was looking at cutting my water loss by more than half. Ah, but I took it a step further and bought a dual-flush model. Press the button on the left and you get “flush-lite,” at .9 gpf. (That’s point-nine, as in less than a gallon.) Press the button on the right and 1.6 gpf takes care of the—um—bigger jobs.

Oh, I’ve heard all kinds of horror stories about the earlier generation of low-flow toilets—how you had to flush two or three times to do the job (and where’s the water savings in that?). But let me assure you that the new models are very efficient.

And I’ll tell you a secret: You can get away with using the .9-gpf button for virtually all situations. Unless you have some digestive issues that I don’t really want to know about.

Check out the EPA’s WaterSense program for more ways to save water in the bathroom.

Immerse yourself in water-wise habits

I’ve always been a shower person, so you can imagine how delighted I was to learn that showers consume less water than baths. A lot less! According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, it takes as much as 70 gallons to fill a tub, while a shower demands only 10 to 25 gallons. (more…)

Reduce pressure on precious water resources by turning off the tap

I could never understand how letting my faucet run while brushing my teeth was an energy issue, or even a waste concern, for that matter. I mean, the water is already there—I’m just releasing it, right? And it’s not like they could divert my plumbing to some drought-stricken part of the world, anyway. (more…)