Graywater, Our Experience

So which is it? Is it Graywater or is it Greywater?

Here in the United States it's definitely GRAYWATER. In Canada, Europe, The U.K. and Australia, it's GREYWATER. This doesn't seem like it's a very big deal. Whats one letter anyway?  As it turns out, in the cyber world, it matters.  If you do a search of Graywater on the internet, you will find all of the domestic (U.S.) companies and public organizations involved with Graywater.  If you do a search for Greywater, you will find all of the overseas and offshore companies that are involved with Greywater . There are exceptions such as greywater guerrillas. These folks have been involved with Graywater since before anyone knew there was a difference. They have a great site and lots of common sense systems. They also have a number of workshops.

So What is Graywater Anyway?

Graywater is any water that has been used for taking showers, bathing and laundry. In this country, (and most others), Kitchen sink water as well as water from the dishwasher is considered Blackwater. This is because of the food particles that can cause health issues if left to sit without proper treatment.

Is Graywater Legal?

Local, State and Federal Government agencies have varying opinions on the use of Graywater. If you want to keep up on the current debates in California, go to  Graywater.org. This blog has the lowdown on  Senate Bill 1258 as it is passing through the content and implementation stages. A lot of the contributors to this bill have Graywater businesses of their own and have been fighting the good fight for a long time in California and in other States. With their input, hopefully California will have 21st century regulations concerning Graywater use.

Being Water has gotten a number of permits for the use of Graywater for toilet flushing, as well as completed a variety of projects. We are happy to pass any of that information on to anyone who asks. just CONTACT US and we will assist you in any way we can. There is a brief history of our experience in this area on the lower portion of this page.

That being said, after much experience with the use of Graywater systems for the purpose of flushing toilets, it is our professional opinion that Graywater use for flushing toilets in residences is not a wise use of money and resources. We have discovered that a comparable amount of water can be saved by doing simple things like changing to a dual flush toilet instead, or even better, using a Dual Flush Conversion Kit.

Let's Look At The Facts:

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that the dual flush conversion kit is the practical choice.  With the packaged residential system used to just flush toilets, it is impractical to install in most instances. There are smaller under sink models on the market, but even they require a permit and clearance from the Health Department to install and the water savings are insignificant based on the price tag of  $400.00.

It does however make sense to look at commercially available Graywater systems for toilet flushing if you are going to use it in applications such as a new Hotel or resort, where health and safety concerns are properly addressed. It has been a concern of many officials that using this type of system in public areas raises a potential health risk to the guests. Especially if there are no redundant disinfection systems in place for the contaminated Graywater i.e water that has been used by guests that could be ill and then transferred to holding tanks and not properly treated.

Our Graywater Story,

A while back, after noting a shortage of working systems on the market, we began development of a small Graywater recycling system that fits under the bathroom sink. we called it the H2O-Mizer. We tested this system at several locations for 9 months and although we had good results with the product itself, we came to the conclusion that the amount of water saved at the bathroom sink was not normally enough to make a significant difference in water savings. Let alone offset the investment involved.Unless of course the user was very wasteful at the sink to begin with. And this type of person doesn't normally look to relatively expensive water conservation devices to offset their over-consumption. So we pulled the product from the market as something that was to much of a niche market to actually make a significant contribution in our current water crisis. The picture on the right is of one of the H2O-Mizer units in a test situation.

The next stage in our evolution was whole house Graywater Systems. We started with fairly expensive commercially available units that we ended up making extensive modifications to or taking back out Altogether. One of these is pictured on the right.  We have learned some important lessons along the way. The most important one is the lesson of filtration, filtration, filtration.  If you are going to do any type of pressurized irrigation with Graywater, or if you are going to use it for other purposes such as toilet flushing, you are going to have to have a system of filtration installed that will take the Graywater particulates down to a level of under about 100 microns. If you don't then you will be spending a lot of time cleaning out your irrigation  systems as well as your toilet mechanisms. This can be reduced to some extent if you follow the recommendations of the manufacturer of these systems and use ample amounts of chlorine in the water. But some of us believe that chlorine isn't good for anything that lives. The best type of system, if you can confine yourself to it, is a gravity system that doesn't rely on any pumps to move the water. This isn't always practical though. Which is why we have focused the majority of our efforts on active systems that put the water where you need it most, and as automatic as possible.

The next two pictures depict the next levels of filtration. We used the good points of an existing Graywater System and built off of it. In the end we have a system that only needs to be tended to every six to nine months.

The first picture shows a working system that has a swimming pool priming pot adapted to it. This works rather well, as it can easily take a high flow of Graywater. The original system had a sock filter that needed cleaning once or twice a week. With this addition the system can work on its own for about a month.

This next picture is actually a hybrid of two different commercially available Graywater Systems. The barrel like object is a Brac Systems RGW 150 and the box looking unit attached to it is a Matala Aqua2use. This combination seems to work pretty good. There are no more problems with filtration. We estimate that the filters in the Matala unit will need to be cleaned after about nine months. We took the sock filter completely out of the Brac as it was more of a hindrance than a help in this case.The Brac System could have actually been whatever type of barrel and pump assembly we wanted. We chose to use it because it was already installed.

Schools Of Thought.

There are several different schools of thought on the subject of Graywater. The first is the low tech approach that says that we should only use simple gravity systems without any storage. These systems are as close to direct runoff as possible, And usually without any filtration at all. They do work very well considering the amount of time and money invested in them. The typical scenario is from a washing machine to mulch basins, using the washing machine pump as the mover of the water.  These systems are called "Laundry to Landscape". If you have enough downhill landscaping from your laundry facilities, don't want to use Graywater in other areas, are not concerned about lint and particulates in the mix and don't feel the need to use other Graywater from showers etc., then this type of system will work well for you.

On the other end of the chart are the expensive commercial and D.I.Y. systems that filter, store and disinfect the water with chemicals such as chlorine for use as toilet flushing, with irrigation as a secondary function. The good part to this type of system is that you can have Graywater pretty much on demand where you need it. The downsides are High cost, they are complex, frequent maintenance, system failures and jurisdictional permitting issues. In our opinion and from personal experience as Graywater Systems Distributors, there are no good, dependable affordable, approved systems on the market in the U.S. as of fall 2009. 

These two extremes show the major thought differences in the Graywater world  today. Inexpensive simplicity with some efficiency as opposed to expensive complexity with a payback period that most wouldn't live to see. True, there are some efficient and well built systems out there, i.e. "Rewater", "Gray Water Recycling Systems", etc., but they are also out of the reach of the 90% of the population that could actually use them. 

Then of course there is the important issue of sustainability. The two commercially available Graywater systems,  Brac Systems and Matala Aqua2use, Are built overseas.  Although the Brac is assembled in Canada. The Matala is manufactured completely in Taiwan. In either case it seems an ineffective use of resources and it contributes to the relative high cost of these units.

There Is A Solution.

With our experience in this arena and after noting what is available and what really works out there, we have come up with a solution to the problem of Graywater recycling using the following criteria:

• Affordable
• Simple
• Expandable
• Safe
• Environmentally friendly using recycled materials
• Built locally
• low maintenance
• Durable  

Using these guidelines we have designed a Graywater System:

• that can easily be built by the average person in a day.
• that can cut your water use in half and allow you to safely irrigate when and where you need it.
• that you can have up and running for under $200.00.
• can be expanded upon to meet your growing use of Graywater. 
• Uses many components that are reused and recycled materials.
  

We are calling this system "Graywater4all"  Some of the components are available on our Graywater components page. The down-loadable D.I.Y. manual will be available in the next four to six weeks