The rain in Spain falls mainly down the drain...

...and it did here too, until we finally got round to sorting out a couple of water butts. One of those jobs that we've meant to do for a while. The recent inclement weather has managed to divert a bit off the flat bay roof and into one of our shiny new green plastic tanks, while the other languishes in the garage until we decide where to put it.

The grape vine embraces its new neighbour

 Anyhoo, it's got us thinking about rainwater harvesting and, following on from that, re-using greywater (the stuff that goes down the drain after a bath or shower for example) to flush the toilet. It's as a bit odd that the water we literally flush down the bog is prime drinking quality - what a waste. Especially the amount that seems to, erm, pass through our toilet in a week. At 6 to 8 litres for the average flush, it soon adds up. Using harvested rain or greywater for flushing purposes makes perfect sense. It's a relatively straightforward DIY project, involving some water butts, some pipework, a pump (solar powered of course!), a loft storage tank and some control gear. Greywater, though more plentiful than rainwater (hard to believe at times) does require some sort of treatment and filtration prior to unleashing it on the porcelain, so we'll need to weigh up the pros and cons of each approach.

We've been meaning to get a water meter fitted for ages (we've been meaning to do a lot of things 'for ages'). A meter should dramatically reduce our bill. Flushing the lav from harvested or recycled water should reduce it considerably more.

I knew my allergy to washing the car would prove useful one day...


Incidentally, most local authorities and water companies have special offers on water butts. What you may not know is that pretty much all these offers are handled by one company, Straight plc. - the same people who supply your council wheelie bin. We found that one of Straight's own webshops was offering better prices than our local council or Severn Trent, so it's worth shopping around. We bought from evengreener.com and the stuff arrived within 2 or 3 days.