November, 2007
2007 - A good year to save on water bills...
The City of Calgary has had a successful year promoting its multi-family toilet replacement rebate program. Approximately 125 successful applicants have replaced over 1500 water-guzzling toilets.
Joining us in this program, HomeDepot has helped to put on not one, but two successful toilet truckload sales. The sales saw great participation, with the benefit being that participants (residential and multi-family building owners) did not have to wait for their rebate – it came off the purchase price right at the till. Look for city-wide toilet truckload sales at HomeDepot again in 2008!
Then again, there is more
to life than just toilets!
Multi-family buildings offer a number of opportunities to reduce water consumption and bring those water bills down. You don’t even have to leave the bathroom to find savings with a new low-flow showerhead (9.5L per minute or 2.5gal./min.) and faucet aerator (5.7L per minute or 1.5gal./min). These inexpensive changes will pay for themselves very quickly as faucets and showerheads combine to account for nearly 30% of water consumption in a building. In addition, the technology behind them has improved to the point that it is unlikely tenants will even notice you have made the exchange. While you are at it, don’t forget to replace the kitchen faucet as well! If you are not sure what the flow rate of your current fixtures are, time how long it takes to fill a 2L container when the tap or showerhead is operating fully open. If it takes less than 20 seconds to fill the container at a faucet or less than 12 seconds at a showerhead then those fixtures are not low-flow fixtures.
Leaks can be
costly!
When you choose to add low-flow devices to your fixtures you are not only reducing water use while they are being operated, but often you are inadvertently repairing leaks. Studies indicate 1 in 4 taps leak, suggesting 1 tap in every two suites could be wasting water to the tune of 10,000 liters/year, costing you over $17 per leak each year! Similarly, 1 in 4 toilets in homes are leaking, losing up to 200,000L per toilet annually. That is another $354 saved for every replaced flapper or new toilet installed!
Take it outside!
Most multi-family buildings/complexes have automatic, underground irrigation systems. These convenient systems allow you to program the watering schedule for your lot and can even be installed with precipitation monitoring to limit watering on days when there has been adequate rain. No doubt watering efficiently will reduce your water consumption during the summer months. The key to keeping these systems saving you money is maintenance. It is critical that the system is blown out each fall to prevent damage to the lines when the ground freezes. Damaged lines can cause expensive, hard to find leaks in the following year and repairs become messy, costly and time consuming.
To make sure your irrigation system is operating at its water-saving best, have an audit done to make sure the heads are spraying where they should be and that the irrigation system is scheduled to your properties’ unique landscape to allow time for the water to absorb into the soil rather than just run-off.
Look for our handy guide ‘Don’t Drain Your
Resources’
to discover more details on how you could be saving water and money at home and
in your building at www.calgary.ca
keyword search for
water conservation and view our ‘Tap into Water Savings’
page or contact us at 3-1-1.
