How Did April Go?

So how did April’s resolution go?  To remind us, what it was:

We had a water meter fitted

Not very exciting but VERY environmental.  We’re doing OK.  it was fitted right at the end of March so we even had a bonus of £5 paid into our new account that we’s paid for last year.

Originally we thought we would carry on as we were for about three months before trying to save water, but we couldn’t do it.  After the TV programmes about climate change and the letters from Bristol Water telling us how much money we could save, we went almost straight for it!

For the first three weeks we didn’t make any special efforts and the usage was 2.324, 3.218 and 2.838 cubic meters.  The second week was higher as we had people staying 6 days out of 7 including 2 toddlers for 4 days.

That’s quite a lot of water, even though we never use tap water for watering.

So during week 4 we tried to think of ways to save more.  Not easy, we now have FIVE water butts and are already careful about not running the tap while we do our teeth etc.

This is what we have come up with:

• Be extra careful about running water while cleaning teeth and washing hands.
• We’ve had a FREE 8L Shower Regulator from Save Water Save Money which we have fitted to our shower – really easy and we barely notice. If you’re in the Bristol area, get yours here.
• We keep a bucket in the kitchen for when we run the tap to get water the correct temperature, eg for washing up. We then use that water for little things during the day such as rinsing hands, watering pot plants and rinsing out recycling.  It’s useful to keep a jug handy for some of these.
• We keep a jug of water in the fridge so that we don’t have to run the tap to get cold water for drinking. We fill it from the cold tap without running it and let it cool.  This has been working well.

My main worry now is running the water before a shower to get it warm.  So far we’ve not kept a bucket in the bathroom for that but watch this space …..

Week 4’s usage was 2.152 so a slight improvement.  We’d like to get it under 2.  When we’ve got a few more readings I’ll publish a nice graph for you to enjoy.

One important note – having the meter fitted was SO EASY and completely free.  Don’t make the mistake that we did of not registering for ebilling first as you get a bit bombarded with paper in the post!