According to the Department of Energy, heating water is the second-largest residential energy use. And your shower is the biggest user of hot water in the entire household, on average consuming 37% of your home's hot water. Luckily, there's a simple, effective and inexpensive way to cut shower water use besides reducing the time you spend in the shower: just replace your conventional showerhead with an energy-efficient low-flow showerhead. Because it adds air to the water, you'll have the same amount of water pressure as you did before, and you won't notice that less actual water is pouring down on you.
What You Should Know
- A standard showerhead uses about 4-6 gallons of water per minute (gpm)--so even a five minute shower can use 30 gallons of water! In contrast, energy-efficient showerheads reduce water use by 50% or more. They typically cut the flow rate to just 2.5 gpm--or less.
- According to the Department of Energy, with an energy-efficient showerhead, not only can you cut water use in half, you can also cut the energy used (and costs) for heating hot water for showers by as much as 50%.
- With
an energy-efficient showerhead, a family of four that normally takes
five-minute showers saves at least 14,000 gallons of water a year.
Easy Things You Can Do
Make sure you are using energy-efficient showerheads. Many utilities offer these showerheads for free or offer rebates on them. You can also pick one up at your hardware store for $10 to $20 and easily install it yourself.- Don't use the low-flow showerhead as an excuse to take longer showers. You won't save any energy or money that way!
- Don't confuse "low-flows" with "water restrictors" (devices you insert into showerheads to cut flow). They're not recommended.
Use showerheads with a shutoff valve, which allows you to turn off the water while you shampoo. When you turn it back on the water will be exactly the same temperature.
Source: You Can Prevent Global Warming: 51 Easy Ways (Jeffrey Langholz, PhD, and Kelly Turner) , and 30 Simple Energy Things You Can Do To Save The Earth (The Earth Works Group, PG&E)