Cost of taking action: £/$/€ SAVES MONEY
This action isn’t as bad as it sounds; we are not suggesting for a moment that you compromise your cleanliness and hygiene!
However, it is true to say that many of us do flush our toilets unnecessarily sometimes. For example, just to dispose of a tissue after blowing your nose, or after putting cleaner into the loo. Or perhaps, after a very tiny pee, it could be left ’til next time!
We think it is a safe bet that in countries where water is continually available without us having to think about it, and especially in houses with multiple bathrooms/toilets, at least one flush a day could be avoided.
Many advocate an old saying: “if it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down!”
Our angle is the preservation of water, but there are several reasons to limit flushing if you can:
- it saves water, a resource we take too much for granted in the developed world
- flushing actually spreads germs by sending up spray from your toilet, especially if you leave the lid up
- urine does not generally contain many bacteria – much less than saliva for example
- for households that pay for water by the cubic metre, it saves money
- it’s quieter at night
- it reduces water pressure for other users (horrible in a shower!)
Saving water
Even in countries where a continual supply of clean water is taken for granted, systems are under strain. Not just our infrastructure, but supplies too; aquifers and reservoirs get very low each summer and our water tables (the natural level of underground water) are being reduced. This impacts on our eco-systems to the detriment of plants and wildlife, as well as on our own water security.
Maths
Let’s look at what missing just one single flush a day could save! We can do this by taking France as a typical developed country with good water infrastructure, and we know there are about 29 million households in France.
An average European toilet flush is 11 litres, so the water saving each year from 1 flush less a day is:
Water saving over a year = (365 x 29,000,000 x 11) litres = 116,435,000,000 litres
A tonne of water is 1,000 litres, so this action in one country alone could save over 116 million tons of water.
Which is a lot!
Please take action
Taking action is easy, just try and avoid flushing your toilet unnecessarily. Please make a commitment to avoid at least one flush a day. As you can see from these figures, it really could make a substantial contribution to protecting our environment and to our own water security.