Water butts and why we need them
The very first practical action that ERA took, back in spring 2020, was to purchase a whole bundle of water butts for our members. So many people at those early meetings of ours were saying that they had always meant to get one, or get another one, but somehow never got around to it. So, ERA did the research and worked out which one seemed the best buy and placed a bulk order, resulting in a single journey to deliver them to a central point here, from where the members who had asked for one could come and collect them from. I wonder how many gallons of tap water have been saved in the two years since then?
The Southern Water website states :
‘Just one water butt can hold enough rainwater to fill a watering can 25 times. Based on the average rainfall in the South East, you could fill your butt up to 450 times a year. All that free water means you can use less tap water, saving you money on your bills.
‘Rainwater is full of nutrients, so your plants will prefer it to tap water. Plus, the less tap water you use, the less we have to take from rivers, reservoirs and underground sources. So, you’ll be reducing pressure on the environment.’ (Taken from this page).
At the time we were purchasing Southern Water were recommending buying from Save Water Save Money Ltd which was what we ended up going for as they turned out to be the most cost effective water butt at the time, and they were made of recycled plastic in the UK.
Subsequently ERA members were able to develop their understanding of how our use of water impacts on climate change at a Zoom talk given by a representative from Southern Water last November. We learnt that we live in a water stressed area, where demand can exceed supply at times. Even at other times when demand is not getting near to potential maximum supply, cleaning our water and pumping it to our homes all comes with a carbon footprint and processing our waste water has an even greater one.
Key suggestions for reducing the amount of water we use and reducing our carbon footprint in the area of water use were:
Avoid bottled water. The full process of making bottled water takes approx three litres of water to produce a one litre bottle. Transport of course uses energy too, with its inevitable carbon footprint
Only flush the ‘3 Ps’ – Pee, Poo and Paper. This will reduce the carbon footprint of processing our waste water
Turn the tap off while you brush your teeth
Shower routinely and take a bath only occasionally for a treat (and even then maybe have one inch less water in there)
Fix dripping taps or toilets that flow on
Only fill the kettle the amount that you need
Have enough water butts so that the vast majority of the time you can water the garden using rainwater