Job creation for the skilless pen pushers ,
Soon there will be more people employed concocking and policing regs. than there are actually doing the work

No, thats not true , all we will have to do is pay them some money to self certify, then it'll be business as usual.
Long live the slackers !

From the post above , these guidelines make good sense and should help people comply
http://www.aecb.net/PDFs/waterstandards/1503_AECB_Water_Vol_1_V3.pdf

Whilst I understand the need to conserve water this is another nanny state plan. The bath volume is measured up to overflow level, my wife has always preferred shallow baths. My Daughter takes half an hour to have a shower whereas I can shower in three minutes (a lot less hair to wash). Where in all these calculations does it take into account these variables????? I am on a water meter (as I think everyone should be) and I pay for what I use which is the best way to make me carefull about my usage.

DarylP

I take your point exactly but my point is if I want a large bath and a shower with a large flow rate I will be refused permission to have them even though my wifes shallow baths and my short showers would consume less than the "notional usage data".

Your analogy of the car can also be interpreted as:- you have a nissan micra and do 100,000 miles a year, I have a V8 jag and do 1000 miles year. Who consumes/pollutes the most.

A difficult subject but I still feel that water meters and education is better than enforcement. There is nothing better than a large bill to focus the mind on consumption.

JTGreen,

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: JTGreen</cite>If you had no choice but to have a nissan micra, then your 1000 miles a year would be massively less polluting than the same 1000 miles per year in a V8 jag.</blockquote>

Obviously correct but the the important word is choice.

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: JTGreen</cite>Water use isn't really like driving though - it's not clear what the analogy is to the mile. Shall we call it the 'water-using events'? In the absence of curious toddlers who like to flush the toilet just to see how they work, it's not clear that 100 fold differences in 'water using events' between individuals in a western society are very common (unlike the driving bit).</blockquote>

Not my initial analogy

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: JTGreen</cite>If you wife likes shallow baths, why does it matter to her if shallow baths are enforced? Long or short shower - why does it matter if the shower pumps at fewer litres per minute? Besides, it doesn't take 30 minutes constant water flow to wash even the longest hair (the limiting factor here is the chill factor in the bathroom which inhibits people from turning the shower off when they shampoo/condition/soap).</blockquote>

Shallow baths are not enforced, its my wifes choice but the notional usage data presumes she has a full bath every time and this is not correct. It does matter to me if the shower pumps fewer litres per minute because I like a lot of water, it is my choice and I pay for water by the cubic metre so I pay for what I use. You try telling my teenage daughter that it does not take 30 minutes to have a shower (this is compensated by my teenage son who never goes near the shower, so that averages out at 15minutes each!!!!!).

We dont have the chill factor problem because our house is very well insulated and cosy.

Yes, the important word is choice.

Why should the people who will suffer the worst effects of CO2 emissions (generally not in the UK) have no choice at all in the CO2 emissions of the most polluting countries? No choice in whether you drive a micra nissan or V8 Jag, or indeed whether you drive 1000 miles or 100,000 miles per year? Green is fine, as long as it doesn't intefere with anyone's freedom of choice to use however much water they like, and however much energy this like - as long as they can afford it (and let's not talk about the externalised costs).

rhamdu,

I also would not want the green provisions in the building regulations weakened but I think there is a fundamental flaw in the assumptions of usage in the water calculator.

I wish i had never mentioned the V8 Jag bit, never had one, would not want one. I just prefer a short shower with a good supply of water.

Fully agree with you about hot tap in bath. I agree that education about water conservation is a priority but I also believe that metering should be mandatory. Water costs money and energy to produce and I fully believe that you should pay for what you use. We pay for gas/oil/electricity on a consumption basis why not water. This does not mean that the price should be high , just fair.

You are correct about the shower, I plan my new build to have rainwater harvesting to include DHW and solar/woodstove

Damon
Is that 1 litre or 1 tonne? Looks like eleven on my little screen.

That will make about 300kg of CO2 per tonne, or at 11 litres a minute, 90 minutes shower time. 3 showers for my lodger or 30 for me.
I take it that includes disposal or waste water as well. Does South West water have a higher footprint as we have the highest cost water in the UK (so I am told).
Seems that we should be using human waste to energy more if that is the case, or is that taken into account?

Trip to opticians for me I think

Joiner

So glad I am not a real environmentalist or I would be stabbing in the dark

Another flawed report (where do you find them all?)

They exclude from their analysis immediate use of untreated greywater for irrigation purposes (i.e. the simplest and most common forms of greywater use). Obviously if you have confined your analysis to the most energy intensive and high tech types of greywater systems, then greywater reuse looks like a non-starter. But that's pretty blinkered, to avoid looking at any 'laundry to landscape', simple gravity-fed systems that don't involve treatment other than by use in mulch beds. Use of collected rainwater in gardens was excluded (why?) They assume that rainwater run-off is not collected in foul sewage drains (why? given that it often is).

How about a comparison of the CO2 produced by flushing your toilet with used bathwater (which meanwhile contributes to your space heating while it sits in the bath) vs. flushing your toilet with mains water? Simple water butt in garden vs. treated mains water to a sprinkler? And in fact they found that short retention systems were 40% less carbon intensive than mains water - so, why is the headline not 'Greywater reuse - either more or less carbon intensive, depending on how you do it'