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Green News: EPA’s WaterSense Label Available for First Commercial Building Product

CONTACT:

Enesta Jones

jones.enesta@epa.gov

202-564-7873

202-564-4355

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 19, 2009

 

EPA’s WaterSense Label Available for First Commercial Building Product

 

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has released its first WaterSense specification for a commercial building product. WaterSense labeled flushing urinals will use 50 percent less water than standard urinals, saving businesses 4,000 gallons of water per year for every model installed.

 

While current federal standards set the maximum allowable flush volume at one gallon per flush, an estimated 7.8 million urinals in use today are older inefficient models. In addition to using no more than a half gallon per flush, urinals bearing the WaterSense label must meet EPA’s performance requirements, ensuring they work as well or better than standard models.

 

In addition to businesses, schools can save by switching to WaterSense labeled urinals; a college with 10,000 students that installs WaterSense labeled urinals in its classroom buildings will save each year enough water to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

 

All WaterSense labeled products are independently tested and certified to meet rigorous criteria for both efficiency and performance. To ensure satisfactory performance, urinals will be tested for flush effectiveness and other measures before they can earn the WaterSense label.

 

The urinals will be available across in the country in a few months.

 

WaterSense is a partnership program sponsored by EPA to protect the future of our nation’s water supply by promoting and enhancing the market for water-efficient products and services.

 

More information: http://www.epa.gov/watersense

 

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Green Quick Tip: Break A Sweat and Save Some Water

Go Green: Save water and get some exercise

Consider sweeping your walkways and driveway, rather than using water to hose them down. This will help to conserve water and keep our waterways cleaner by keeping oil, antifreeze and lawn chemicals out of them.

If you found this post helpful, please pass it along to a friend.

Thank you for reading and here's to Going Green!

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Going Green: 12 Tips On Watering Your Lawn

Go Green Grass Care: Water Your Lawn Correctly and Responsibly With These 12 Tips

1. Water your lawn in the early morning hours.
2. Factor in soil type, grass species, rainfall, evapotranspiration, amount of sun & shade to help you determine how much & how often you should water.
3. Buy a timer to turn your watering system on and off.
4. Pick the right sprinkler for your needs (ask your local garden center for help).
5. Use wetting agents if your soil is not absorbing water efficiently.
6. Check on local ordinances before using gray water (recycled water from clothes washers, bathtubs, etc) to water your lawn.
7. Dethatch and aerate if there is too much dying grass which can lead to soil becoming compacted and less able to absorb water.
8. Match the correct grass species to your climate which will help cut down on watering.
9. Raise your mower blade so your grass stays healthy and requires less watering.
10. Consider your source of water when determing how often and how much to water your grass.
11. Plant drought tolerant plants rather than lawn grasses to decrease your water use.
12. In drought like conditions, let the grass go into dormancy. You can wake it up next year.

Have any other tips to add?

If you found this post helpful or the previous posts from this week, please pass them along to a friend.

Thank you for reading and here's to Going Green!

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Green Product of the Week: Dual Flush Toilet Kit

Go Green: Install a Dual Flush Toilet Kit to Save Water

I came across a pretty unique kit that you can install in your current toilet that will allow you to choose to flush with Half the normal amount of water or a Full flush when needed. This is a great tool that could save a family of four 20,000 gallons of water per year since most toilet flushes only require a small amount of water to clean the bowl. This is also an inexpensive alternative to buying a low-flow toilet.

The Flush Choice™ conversion kit is a high quality product that is inexpensive and proven to save you money. It can be installed by anyone following the simple instructions or you can have a licensed plumber do it for you.

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Have you considered a dual flush conversion kit? What have your experiences been?

Here's to Going Green!

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Green Quick Tip: Get Creative To Save Water

Go Green: 5 Quick & Easy Ways To Save Water

1. Turn off the water while brushing your teeth
2. Fix all leaky faucets
3. Place plastic bottles filled with sand or stone in your toilet tank
4. Only water your lawn once a week and skip a week when it rains
5. Change to low flow shower heads and faucets

Here's to Going Green!

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Green Tips: Water Conservation: Faucet Facts #green

One really easy way to conserve water is to turn off the faucet while brushing your teeth. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the average bathroom faucet flows at a rate of two gallons per minute. Turning off the tap while brushing your teeth in the morning and at bedtime can save up to 8 gallons of water per day, which equals 240 gallons per month.

Once you are done brushing your teeth, you should make sure to turn the faucet all the way off so it doesn't drip. If the faucet continues to drip after you turn it off be sure to get it fixed. If a faucet is dripping at a rate of one drop per second, 2,700 gallons of water per year would be wasted.  This all adds to the cost of water and sewer utilities; not to mention wasting a resource that is not infinite.

Here is a very helpful video on YouTube on fixing a leaky faucet.

Here's to going green!

Green Tips: Water Conservation: Toilet Water Saver

Did you know that toilets account for the largest percentage of water use in homes today?  A conventional toilet can use more than 3.5 gallons per flush.  One solution to this problem would be to upgrade to a low-flow toilet (one that uses less than 1.6 gallons of water per flush).  Or, for a quick and cheaper fix, you can fill one or two soft drink bottles with water and some stones, cap them, and place them in your toilet's tank.  By doing this, you will be able to reduce the amount of water it uses when flushing.  In addition, you can check for leaks by adding some food coloring to the toilet tank and, if after a couple of minutes, you see any of the food coloring in the toilet bowl, you know you have a leak that needs to be fixed.

Do you have any other tips to share with us?

Green Tips: Water Conservation: Low Flow Showerhead

To help conserve water, install a low-flow showerhead in all of your showers.  Aside from using less water, low-flow showerheads also cut down on natural gas, because there is less water for the water heater to replenish and heat.  A low-flow showerhead will save 204 lbs. of CO2 emissions each year.  If you are worried about a decrease in water pressure, try the low-flow showerheads that use oxygen to push less water out at a higher pressure, such as the showerheads made by Oxygenics®.