How to reduce bathroom water consumption and save money

Have you ever wondered how much water do you use during your daily bathroom activities?

It may actually come to a surprise to realize the high amount of water that we use daily for bathing and showering and, even if our water bill may not be that high, it is worth to try to cut the amount of water we waste.

We call it to wasted water because we may have the same results with less water usage. Let us show you what we are talking about.

Measuring bathroom water consumption

First we need to know how much water we are using and then we can decide if we are wasting water and where we can start saving water.

For measuring the tap and shower water usage we have used a one liter bucket and we have timed how long does it takes to get it filled to the one liter mark.

For measuring the toilet flushing water usage, we have just taken water meter readings before and after flushing. We knew that we have a dual flush toilet and that the standard is three liters for liquid waste and six liters for solid waste. The water meter reading has just confirmed that the toilet water tank capacity is not that well setup.

This are the results:

It is shocking to realize how much water it is being used in just a few second, specially while showering.

Know that we know how much water we are using per second, the next steps we took were to measure the time: how long the daily showers take, how many liters we were using for filling up the bath tube for the children and to estimate for how long we are using the sink every day.

We have used all that data to estimate how much water we use during year and then calculate the total cost at a prize of 2,2 euro per cubic meter (cubic meter = 1000 liters) for our family of two adults and two small children.

Now that we have estimated how much water and money we are spending and where we are spending it, we know that the water fixtures are using a considerable amount of water in just a few seconds so we started checking if it was possible to (reasonably) reduce the water flow through a cost effective solution.

Reduce shower water wastage by installing a water flow reduction valve

After some research, we decided that an easy and economic way of reducing the shower head water flow is to install a adjustable water flow valve.

With this valve we have managed to reduce the shower water flow from 1 liter every 5,5 seconds to 1 liter every 8,5 seconds without actually noticing any difference while getting showers.

The advantage of the valve is that it is manually adjustable so if some day we need to increase the water flow rate, we can do it without any effort. Or, if our small children are just playing with water while enjoying their shower, we can decrease the water flow up to 1 liter every 10 seconds without them noticing any difference.

Additionally, we valve is discrete and unless you know it is there it is barely noticeable. For more details and specifications, this is the link to the valve sold in Amazon.

Reduce sink water wastage by reducing the water flow

Another solution that just popped up by having a closer look was that we could adjust the sink water flow rate by just adjusting the hot and cold water flow valves.

This way, we have adjusted the flow rate from 1 liter every 5 second to 1 liter every 9 second and even though the flow reduction is noticeable, the truth is that the water flow was far to much and we were just wasting too much water.

1 liter of water every 9 seconds for cleaning hands, face or washing the teeth it is more than enough.  bit of awareness.

Reduce water consumption by installing a water saving tap aerator

Old faucet models run on average of around 15 liters of water per minute while a standard aerator can reduce the water usage to as little as 6 litters per minute. Water saving tap aerators can reduce the water consumption even further and due to their low cost and easy installation are most definitely a water saving method to have in consideration.

We have installed a water saving tap aerator and the results speak by themselves.

Have a look to the video below for more information. We are working towards making the videos available in different languages so, if English is not your main language, have a look to our YouTube channel for other language options

Dual flushing toilets

The toilet flushing didn’t present any water saving opportunity. Our house has a toilet with dual flushing system which is one of the most efficient solutions on the market.

Some very old toilet use considerable amounts of water, up to 15 liters per flush . If this is your case and you are thinking about investing or not into a new toilet flushing system, just take some readings, crunch some numbers and the result may help into deciding if the saving are worth the investment.

We hope you have found the information useful.

Do you want to know more? Visit our website and let's us guide through other water saving opportunities.