Kelly's Healthy Home

Cutting down on your water consumption is good for the environment and your wallet. With our local water company rate increase proposal, this is especially a good time to seriously start looking at how you can make a change at home. (Check out details here: http://www.puc.state.pa.us). So where can you start? Two of the main areas to consider upgrading are at the kitchen and bathroom faucets.

When researching for a new faucet, look for a WaterSense label. These products use at least 20% less water, save energy and perform well. Some intriguing facts from the EPA website:

• Replacing showerheads with WaterSense- labeled models can save 4 gallons of water every time you take a shower
• Replacing old, inefficient faucets and aerators with WaterSense-labeled models can save 700 gallons of water per year
• WaterSense-labeled faucets—or aerators that can be installed on existing bathroom faucets—are about 30 percent more efficient than standard faucets while still providing sufficient flow

Home Depot, Amazon and Lowe’s enables you to filter your searches too!

Don’t want to replace an entire faucet? Then you can simply replace the aerator. Depending on the aerator, you could save 2 to 16 gallons a day! Don’t worry, your pressure should not change either. I checked my bathroom faucets and they are 2.2 gallons per minute aerators-it’s written on the part. So I’ve started to replace the aerators for now until I know what faucet I want in the future (I’m always wanting to renovate and change things around the house!). If you buy 1.5 or 1 you’ll significantly reduce your water consumption for a fraction of the cost.

Remember, small changes add up.