Waste water capture and re-use

[-rick-]

5 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Our background radiation is too high to have a nuclear power station apparently, though that story has been told to me for 50 years, so no idea if it is really true.

 

Restriction within nuclear facilities are extremely stringent. No sure where I heard this (online pre clickbait/slop I think) but a funny story was the university phd student working at the universities small research reactor managed to set off the radiation alarm as he came into the facility thanks to a different hair gel he was using.

 

Initially you think this seems a bit crazy but thinking more (my own thoughts, not checked) I can imagine the detectors are relatively simple and detections of small amounts of certain isotopes would indicate a big problem whereas some other isotopes are naturally occurring at that those levels in some places.

[saveasteading]

2 hours ago, -rick- said:

I have interest in using it to flush toilets and external (garden/window cleaning/etc) uses.

I've done that for an office. All toilets flushed with rainwater, but that's all. We couldn't fit an outside tap with it in case someone drank it.  I guess we could have fitted a mayal pump for gardening use.

The capital cost is high with a separate plumbing system, the tank and the pump.

Otoh the saving in water was huge AND sewage charges are based on water supplied, assuming what comes in goes out again.

40 ish persons in the building and it was very good economically as well as sustainably.  10m3 tank never ran dry.

The sums will change for domestic use.

 

[SteamyTea]

26 minutes ago, -rick- said:

other isotopes are naturally occurring at that those levels in some places.

But still deadly.

There used to be very high incidences if lung cancers down here. Mines closed and better radon control and they the dropped to almost national averages.

There is still a lot of lung disease in the St. Awful region to do with the old china clay production facilities.

[-rick-]

1 minute ago, saveasteading said:

I've done that for an office. All toilets flushed with rainwater, but that's all. We couldn't fit an outside tap with it in case someone drank it.  I guess we could have fitted a mayal pump for gardening use.

 

A google was not helpful in telling me what a mayal pump is. Do you mean fixed irrigation system (which is the type of use I would be thinking of).

 

Maybe there was a difference given this sounds like a commercial property but water butts are allowed (with tap) so I expect whatever issue you ran into would be able to be dealt with. (With the idea to keep the water as clean as possible in the first place if I do get the chance to do this the water would almost certainly be much cleaner than that from a water butt).

 

1 minute ago, saveasteading said:

The capital cost is high with a separate plumbing system, the tank and the pump.

...

The sums will change for domestic use.

 

As someone who plans to do a lot of the installation work myself and who drinks a lot of water (and therefore uses the toilet a lot) the sums will indeed be very different. Still I doubt 10 year cost savings alone would be worth it. 10 year cost savings plus the ability to use the water to maintain a productive garden during a hosepipe ban may well be.

[-rick-]

2 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

But still deadly.

There used to be very high incidences if lung cancers down here. Mines closed and better radon control and they the dropped to almost national averages.

There is still a lot of lung disease in the St. Awful region to do with the old china clay production facilities.

 

St Awful! 🤣

 

That particularly situation is man made. I'm sure you know more about this than I but I had thought there were plenty of places globally with relatively elevated levels of radiation that show similar health profiles to low radiation places.

[saveasteading]

1 hour ago, -rick- said:

what a mayal pump is

oops. Manual. sorry to have wasted your time.

I'm thinking one of these so fills buckets but not mouths