How to cut your water waste at the source

How smart faucets can help you save water in the bathroom

Bathrooms are the rooms where we use – and waste – the most water. Take the simple act of brushing your teeth – if you leave your bathroom faucet running, that’s 19 litres of water. Every time. And showering? Add another 12 litres of water for every minute.

Bathrooms are the rooms where we use – and waste – the most water.

However, by making some simple changes – such as switching to a touchless faucet and changing some bad water habits – you can cut your overall usage in half. Here are some tips for how to conserve water from bathroom showers and faucets and save money on your water bill every month.

 1. Do a water audit

If you check your rates notice, this may show your household’s daily water consumption. You can also call your water supplier – they may have an online tool or app you can use to track. They may also recommend checking your water meter at the same time every month and tracking your usage manually.

By checking your water consumption on a semi-regular basis you can quickly detect any water wastage or unexplained increases in water use, such as a leak. By making yourself more aware of how much water you use, the chances are you will pay more attention every time you turn on a faucet – and learn to turn it off sooner rather than later.

2. A bath or shower? Which one uses more water?

If you tend to shower for less than 10 minutes, you’ll generally save more water by sticking to a shower instead of a having a bath. However, if you love showers that are longer than 10 minutes, you may actually save more water by taking a bath.

Either way, you can be smart about how much water you use: when having a bath, put the plug in the moment you start running the shower faucet – by the time the tub is filled, it won’t matter if the water ran cold to begin with. And if you’re showering, you could simply swap shower gel for soap – with the latter requiring less time to wash off.

Cutting your shower by one second is worth 1.5 hours of battery life on a 13-inch Mac Book Air

You could also take it further by cutting your shower a little, or by running your bath for a shorter period of time. You could also install water-saving hand showers, showerheads that help limit water flow. Even cutting your shower by one second is worth 1.5 hours of battery life on a 13-inch Mac Book Air.*

3. Install smart faucets

 Overall, one of the easiest ways to help reduce your annual water consumption – up to 50% – is by switching to smart automatic faucets. While reducing water usage tends to fall on the user, smart fittings – mixers and faucets – take on a lot of the responsibility by doing the work for you.

 For example, you can set our smart washbasin faucets to suit your individual requirements. Just link your faucet to the Oras app and control functions such as flow rate and afterflow. The faucet will only run water for as long as you need – no more, no less – so you can reduce water consumption without interrupting your daily bathroom routine.

 At Oras, we conducted an analysis in an office building in Finland where all bathroom faucets were changed to touchless faucets. We found that touchless faucets offered roughly 25.5% in water savings and about 9.7% in energy savings.

Want to find out more about how your family can save water?

* Chair of Information Systems and Energy Efficient Systems, University of Bamberg

** According to British Columbia Centre for Disease Control