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Green Building Bible, Fourth Edition
Green Building Bible, fourth edition (both books)
These two books are the perfect starting place to help you get to grips with one of the most vitally important aspects of our society - our homes and living environment.

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Fundamentals: Rainwater or Greywater recycling?

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    I'm inclined to go for some rainwater recycling simply because it would not need any treatment before being used for washing machine, toilets etc, whereas greywater needs UV treatment (unless just used for toilets I guess).

    Are there any other considerations between the two that I ought to know about? Thoughts appreciated.
    • CommentAuthorevan
    • CommentTimeMay 12th 2010 edited
     
    I would (will) use rainwater for the washing machine and toilet.

    I think the best way to deal with greywater is with the enclosed plant-bed technique used in the Earthship. This waters the plants and allows them to capture extra food and nutrients. The water left over from that is surprisingly clean and fresh (in fact in the earthship that water is then used for toilet flushing without further treatment).

    Trying to filter and treat it "artificially" sounds difficult and expensive in energy terms, and probably unsatisfactory.
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      CommentAuthordjh
    • CommentTimeMay 12th 2010
     
    I don't know what the enclosed plant-bed technique is. Are there any descriptions of it around? I googled a bit and did find a couple of pages with some info about greywater in general:

    http://www.barnstablecountyhealth.org/AlternativeWebpage/Greywater/Greywater.htm
    http://www.umassgreeninfo.org/fact_sheets/plant_culture/gray_water_for_gardens.html
    • CommentAuthorCWatters
    • CommentTimeMay 12th 2010
     
    I would suggest rainwater you need some treatment/filtering if just used for washing. We have an underground tank used for garden watering. It has quite a good filter to stop leaves getting in and an anti-stirring device to slow the water so it doesn't stir up any sediment...yet we do ocasionally get brown water comming out of the hose.
    • CommentAuthorevan
    • CommentTimeMay 12th 2010
     
    djh: here's the thing I'm talking about: http://www.lowcarbon.co.uk/earthship-brighton/plants-treat-waste

    CWatters: definitely, a household water filter is needed.
    • CommentAuthorwastetech
    • CommentTimeMay 19th 2010 edited
     
    You also need to make sure that the tank you buy is made in one piece - not in 2 halves like a lot of the rainwater harvesters out there. It is a complex operation to join them together (they are shipped in 2 halves to reduce shipping costs as they can be stacked like eggboxes) and if they leak, you can't repair them without taking them out again. Take a look at this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLg9Y58T_tY of how to assemble the tanks and then decide if you want to trust a groundworker to do it absolutely right!
    Nearly all of the German systems are split tanks but there are some good UK manufactured systems also. Try http://www.oasis-rainharvesting.co.uk, made in Yorkshire.
      OASIS%206000%20Tank small.jpg
      OASIS%20Logo.jpg

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