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Friday, March 19, 2010
Stop flushing your money down the toilet
I never realized how much money I was literally flushing down the toilet each month.
Last summer I purchased a 1964 ranch house in need of a lot of updating. Most of the home was at original builders’ grade, including the toilets. This didn’t bother me too much until my water bill jumped $70, caused by one of these old fixtures leaking.
Immediately I began researching for a suitable replacement. According to toiletology.com, my old flusher was guzzling 5.5 gallons of water with every flush. With an average of 10 flushes a day in my two-person household, that adds up to more than 20,000 gallons of water a year going down the toilet.
I’ve always leaned toward being green because of the value financially and environmentally. I found a Glacier Bay toilet at Home Depot for just $98 with the WaterSense seal, meaning it meets rigorous U.S. EPA standards for water conservation. At just 1.28 gallons a flush, this toilet will reduce my water use by 15,403 a year over my old toilet if I flush 10 times a day, like my previous example.
I saved more money by having my husband install it. The most plumbing he’s ever done is install a new faucet, but he was able to knock out this project in just 45 minutes.
I did worry if the toilet would be able to clear the bowl using so much less water and power than my old flusher. After a few days getting used to having to hold the lever down longer (my old one you barely tapped it and it would flush) I can report it works very well and has impressed me with how quickly the tank recycles.
- If you’re not convinced about how much you can save by just replacing one toilet with a new Water Sense model, look at these figures from the EPA:
- Toilets account 30 percent of the average household water bill. Energy-efficient toilets use 20 percent less water than older toilets.
- A family of four can save $99 annually by replacing one toilet that was installed between 1980 and 1994 with a WaterSense-labeled toilet.
- A new toilet can save up to 16,000 gallons of water in one year for a family of four. This is roughly equivalent to two backyard swimming pools.
- If just one percent of American homes replaced an older toilet with a new WaterSense-labeled toilet, the country would save more than 38 million kilowatt-hours of electricity — enough to supply more than 43,000 households for one month.
For more on how you can save by replacing your toilet, click here.
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