Did you know, by installing a water boosting pump to improve water pressure across the home, it can help save water and energy consumption, therefore money?
Research has been undertaken by the University of Surrey, Bristol and Swansea; beyond the water flow rate. They analysed over 86,000 individual showering events by installing sensors and gathering data including water flow rates and average shower lengths. The findings show that by increasing water pressure, it can help to reduce water consumption by up to 60% as although high pressure showers were taken, the shower was turned off earlier, delivering less water overall suggesting it’s a showering experience that is the key, not a set of actions.
The research also found that installing visible shower timers reduced shower length. Smart timers helped to reduce consumption by up to 53% with middling water pressures. Across the research, water consumption dropped from 60 litres per shower in those with low pressure to under 17 litres for those with higher pressure and a timer.
The Government target for 2050 is to reduce the current personal consumption from 142L of water per day to 110L per person, per day. The Energy Saving Trust estimates that Britain uses 840 billion litres annually, and spends £2.3 billion on heating water for showers alone, with hot water accounting for 875kg of CO2 emissions per household.
Bathroom manufacturers have made advancements in shower technology with efficient showerheads, restricted flow and boost functions, but these typically need 2-3bar pressure to function correctly. The water authorities need only to supply a minimum pressure of 0.7 bar (mandated) and due to ageing infrastructure, underinvestment and the potential for leakage, many homes suffer from low water pressure across Britain.
Across the showering events analysed, 4.4 million litres of hot water was used and around 15 tonnes of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent). If everyone in the country had a low flow, high pressure shower we could potentially save 15-20L of water per shower.
Mark Ayckbourn, Product Manager at Stuart Turner comments “Plumbers, bathroom installers and trade can play a crucial part in raising awareness of water usage and pressure with end users and homeowners, installing water boosting solutions to give the homeowner a better showering experience while saving them money. Landlords and social landlords retrofitting existing housing stock who want to act sustainably and save on water and energy also have a part to play as typically, tenants would not have control over fitting this into the home. New builds can also benefit from higher water pressure by using water boosting equipment – especially with bathrooms located on 3rd floor properties to help improve the water pressure.
“At Stuart Turner we offer a range of water boosting solutions, like our Monsoon shower pump for vented systems which can really support a household boosting water across the whole property, not just the shower. For households with combi-boilers we have our STORMBOOST water pump which is designed to be connected directly to the incoming mains supply, boosting up to 2.5 bar. We also offer larger solutions such as our Mainsboost range, storing water ready for when its needed and iBoost, our integrated water storage tank and high performance, multi-stage pump to overcome restricted waterflow and insufficient pressure. From small domestic properties to large residential, talk to us about our solutions.”