How to Flush Your Toilet Using Rain Water

jchait — Sat, 03 May 2008 18:44:55 -0400

If you've ever built a rain barrel, or harvested your own rain water in some way, then you know how easy it is. You can use rain water to water your yard, wash your car, and any number of other uses. What if you could fairly easily use rain water to flush your toilet? Think of all the water you'd save.

Some house do utilize rain water for flushing, as do public buildings, so the possibility is reasonable for you if you own a home. Recently I saw a cool post at Seattlepi.com - at their reader blog section. The post, Flushing Your Toilet with Rainwater, covers a neat resource,a Rain Barrel to Toilet Installation Guide.

The individual who wrote this guide did a good job. It's not hard to follow and there are some great illustrations - both photos and diagrams. It's also a easy project to find parts for; this person snagged everything from the local Home Depot. The guide even discusses extras like backflow protection; a step not required in all states, but it's there, and is simple. Also extra a nice bit about attaching a water meter inside, so you can see just how much you're using. Best of all the entire installation cost around $100. A steal!

Best of all, of course are the environmental impacts. Curiously, the guy who did this is living in Seattle. Being in Oregon and the Washington myself, people often act like water conservation is a joke; I mean, we have so much rain. But rain coming down, does not equal plenty to go around. We still need to conserve when possible.

Learn more:

How Much Do You Know About Water Use?

flushing toilets

How to Flush Your Toilet Using Rain Water