Low Flow Shower Heads

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 17 percent of residential indoor water use is attributed to showering.  The EPA recently put out a standard for shower head manufacturers to be able to have there "WaterSense" logo on them.  To read more about the water sense certifications for shower heads, you can visit read about it at the EPA's website.

Many Shower heads before 1992 can use huge amounts of water.  We are talking more than 5 gallons per minute.  While this is nice to get the shampoo out of your hair quickly, it is never required and will empty your water heater very quickly.  Causing unneeded energy consumption in addition to the wasted water. Low flow shower heads will help alleviate some of this energy and water waste.

So if you are in the market for a new shower head, make sure it has the "Watersense" logo on it.  You can find many different low flow shower heads on our website.

How to Flush Dirty Water From The Pipes In Your Home after Possible Water Contamination

A water main burst can cause contaminates to enter your drinking water supply.  Of course boiling your water will get rid of all contaminates, but following these simple steps will help clear any contaminates from your tap water after a boil order has been issued from a city.   Here are some tips:

Cold Water:  Run tap for 1 minute or more before drinking or tooth brushing

Hot Water:  Never use only hot water straight from the water heater for drinking or food preperation.
Note:  not sure about the new tank-less water heaters recently emerging in society since water does not actually stay in the tank like old water heaters.  


Water Dispenser on the Fridge:  Flush at least one quart of water before drinking.   
Note:  You might want to replace the filter as well as it could possibly hold contaminates inside after being flushed through.

Dishwashers:  Run dishwasher empty one time before washing dishes in them.

Food and Baby Formula: Discard of any baby formula which may have contained tap water or food prepared for baby's on the day of a boil order.

Ice Cubes:  Always empty your ice cube tray after a boil order has been announced.  Also discard any ice made over a 24 hour period after a boil order has been announced.

Students in a New Jersey School Work To Save Energy and Reduce Waste

An elementry school in New Jersey is competing with 13 other buildings to represent New Jersey in a national competition for energy efficiency.  Van Holtem Primary School is being monitored by EPA's measurement and tracking tools from online. Principle George Rauh says "We are committed to improving our energy efficiency and we look forward to seeing how we measure up against other buildings across the nation." 

Rauh says that since September of last year, they have saved over $10,000 in electricity, gas, water consumption and heating costs.   All they do is the basic tasks that all facilities should do like turning off the lights and water faucets, and finding ways to insulate and reduce heating costs.  Rauh contributes most of the efforts to a group of 4th graders called the School Energy Efficiency Squad.  Squad Member Julia Brickfield who is 10 checks the empty rooms for lights that haven't been turned off during her recess time.  She says "saving energy is more important than just going outside and playing.  We're doing something that really matters."  Rauh finds that sometimes he finds that the students are teaching the parents and staff about how to be efficient.

New Digital Temperature Shower Head

In the world of digitality, we gotta have super new wave digital shower head for our bathroom.  Some cats in Germany have come up with "The AquaFountain" by Grohe's Ondus collection.  This little number lets you set the exact temperature on the keypad.  It can hold temperature settings in memory for 2 different users.  This can come in really handy if you have a new tankless electric water heater.  


The tankless water heaters heat the water based on pressure and this makes it very sensitive.  By having a digital gauge that can set the exact temperature you need, their is not much need to change the temperature all the time to get the right temp.


A little over the top, but it also has a phone on it that will turn off the shower so you can answer that important call. Not sure I would want to halt the water flow every time a telemarketer wants to ask a question.  And to top it all off, it even has a nice timer so you can limit your shower time and conserve some water.

A Couple of New Faucet Inventions Include...

There are a couple of new techie devices for faucets that are pretty neat:

First we have the "Spring-Loaded Smart Faucet." (shown to the right here) It can attach to pretty much any tap.  You can leave the faucet handles open and the water doesn't run unless you are pressing on the slick chrome vertical bar over there.  This one might be a little over the top for saving money on water, but it can definitely help with hot water savings and what not.  It is basically an alternative for having the motion sensor to turn the water on.

Second, if you really want to work for your water, a designer named Harvey Bewley has come up with the "Twist Faucet" which is this one over to the left.  To get the water out of this thing you have to crank the knob.   It also has a digital read-out that shows how much water you are consuming as well as a water temperature gauge.  This is new age faucet is just a concept right now, so you can't really get this one in the store quite yet.  Still it is a neat idea, and I think temperature gauges are up and coming seeing as how the digital temperature is almost required for the new instant water heaters some  residence have starting installing in their homes.