Grey water experiments
It bothers me enormously that we use drinkable water to flush toilets. Granted, the last winter was a very wet one, and extensive flooding can make it feel like water shortage is no issue… but all the water we use comes from somewhere. Whether depleting underground reserves or emptying rivers, human water consumption has a big impact on aquatic life. Our amphibians are not thriving. We hardly return water in decent condition, either. Loaded with poisonous chemicals, alongside all our more regular waste, and having been treated with chlorine, it has to be cleaned up before it can be re-released into the wild.
As Pagans we might honour water as one of the four elements, we might speak in ritual of the place water has in mythology. Our ancestors held rivers sacred, associating deities with them – because water was, and is, essential for life. If we don’t back that up by treating water respectfully in our day to day lives, it rather defeats the object. So what is to be done about the toilet?
I don’t have the option of replacing it with an earth closet – I live in a flat. I can cut down use with the old maxim of “if its yellow, let it mellow, if it’s a poo, flush it through.”
At the same time, used water from other activities is poured down the sink. So I’m throwing away already dirty water so that I can use clean water to flush away shit. A while back I started exploring possible alternatives. I have a 5 litre water bottle with handle, sourced for a different project that had now run its course. I have a cut off bottle top that makes a good funnel, and I started reclaiming used water to see what could be re-used for flushing the toilet. Here are my results.
Vegetable water doesn’t work because it can undertake to ferment surprisingly quickly, and gets smelly in hot weather. It can however be left to cool and used to feed and water plants – so long as you cook without salt.
Washing up water is too greasy and also can ferment and smell funny, and left an odd residue in the water bottle. Unless you can go straight from sink to toilet with no pauses, this seems not to be a good idea.
Shower water is tricky to collect. However, taking my water bottle with me into the shower I regularly harvest enough re-usable water to be able to rinse the bathtub out afterwards, which is a small win.
Water used when sterilizing bottles, jars, demijohns etc reuses very well.
Laundry water turns out to be the best. I’m handwashing, so it’s not difficult to put a water extraction stage into the process. Laundry water is stable, does not ferment, and tends to be a little bit soapy, which works well when flushing the toilet. Handwashing uses a lot less water than a machine would, but I can typically extract enough water for two flushes from each laundry load. That might seem small, but an efficient toilet uses about 5 litres a flush – as I do. So that’s ten litres a washing load. Just assuming I do one laundry load a week, over a year I’ve cut my water use by 520 litres. With two loads a week it would be 1400 litres. That’s a lot of water.
