Be Smarter With Your Water - Water Saving Week

29 April 2019 15:55

NI Water is supporting Waterwise and the annual Water Saving Week by asking customers to be smarter with their water.

The campaign is running from Monday 29^th April to Friday 3^rd May with a water usage theme for each day. Anna Killen, Environmental Learning and Outreach Officer at NI Water explains, “Whilst Northern Ireland has a reasonable amount of rainfall, we still need our customers to be ‘water wise’ and realise the importance of conserving water; especially businesses, when it could reduce the cost of their bill.

“Follow us on social media for our top tips each day on how you can be smarter with your water and adopt some simple water saving habits around the home. It doesn’t take much time or effort for example on ‘Toilet Tuesday’, check whether you have a handle or a dual flush toilet. A dual flush toilet uses 9 litres of water per flush, however the modern dual flush will only use 6 litres. 

“On ‘Tap Thursday’ think about the water you drink, do you run the tap until it is cold? Or do you fill the kettle right to the brim unnecessarily? Try putting a jug of water in the fridge and only fill the kettle with the amount of cups you need; top tip – this will also save on electricity.”

NI Water’s top ten water saving tips include:

1. Turn off the tap when brushing your teeth - A running tap can use 6 litres of water per minute.
2. Take shorter showers - Why not challenge yourself and your family to shower one minute quicker? In a year you could save up to 10,000 litres of water! Take a shower instead of a bath - One bath can use up to 100 litres of water, whereas an efficient shower uses under 50 litres. But remember power showers can use more water than baths;
3. Car washing – use a bucket and sponge instead of a hose;

4.     Lawns are great survivors - a sprinkler can use as much as 1,000 litres of clean drinking water in a single hour; more than a family of four would use in a whole day. Even when they look dry and brown, they’ll spring back with the first heavy rain;

5.     Use a bowl for washing vegetables - You can reduce water waste by using a bowl to wash and prepare your vegetables. Then you can use the water to rinse your recycling bin.

6.     Make full use of your washing machine - Half load programmes on washing machines use more than half the water and energy of a full load, so wait until the machine is full before switching it on.

7.     Turn off the tap - Simply turning off the tap while washing your hands or shaving can save over 6 litres of water every minute!

8.     Fix leaking taps - A dripping tap can waste more than 60 litres of water per week.

9.     Keep a jug of water in the fridge - Planning ahead means there is no need to run the water until it gets cold.

10.  Fill the kettle with only as much water as you need - This will save water and energy.

“By making small, mindful changes to our daily habits, we can all do our part to save more water now to help sustain it for our future generation of water users.”

If you are a community group or business our education team can offer a FREE talk on water efficiency and even supply you with some water saving devices such as a ‘save a flush’, a waterbutt and shower timers.  Email education@niwater.com for availability.

NI Water’s water efficiency pages can be found by logging on to https://www.niwater.com/water-saving/