Room by room steps to reduce global warming and your electricity bill.

Step 3 Bathroom and Laundry

Free:
1. Put a bucket under the shower when it is heating up and then use it to flush a toilet or water a new tree or plants.
2. Instead of using the heat lamps try using the normal light in the center. they use a lot less energy and give enough light to see with still.
3. When drying clothes, instead of drying them in the dryer, hang them on the washing line, or if it is rainy outside put them on a clothes airer in front of a warm place (fire or heater).
4. Do your teeth quickly and use a towel to dry your hair.

Pays for itself:
Fix leaky taps in the house. It normally only needs a new washer which costs about $1 each. Try seeing how much water is wasted with this drip calculator. Link

Get a AAA shower head in your bathroom. It uses a lot less water!

Not free:
If you need to get a new appliance try getting an energy star compliant model, the higher the stars the better. Also use the economy wash on the dishwasher and the cold wash in the clothes washer.
When getting a new toilet try to get a dual flush model instead of a single flush so when you don't need to flush as heavily (Hint hint) you only use half the amount of water.

What we have done this step:
We have saved water and electricity.

Comments

[COMMODORE64]

Dryer, bad? Why? No, you are just too paranoid about laundry system. Just leave laundry equipment out of this topic, because they are important to our life due to hygienic living.

[=spider=]

Out of interest, how are dryers important to "hygienic living"? Dryers are the worst culprits for hiking up your electricity bill. Ours went up $100 when our flatmate got a dryer right before winter. It saves a lot of money to avoid using them except when extremely necessary.

[COMMODORE64]

No, not if you have High Efficiency washer and dryer. Dryer that uses natural gas runs cheaper than electric, and i suggest you to re-consider about that. Sure, the laundry is expensive for us, but it wont hurts to do it 1 - 2 times a week, separated loads at night. That'll give you a light bill because the night isn't the rush hour.

[totally_screwed]

Why is a Dryer really necessary? What's wrong with hanging the washing out to dry outside when it's warm? Solar UV will also help sterilise the textiles, which AFAICK, 'dryers' do not. Cheaper AND better!

[=spider=]

I agree with stranoster. Even the most efficient natural gas dryer is still using a non-renewable fossil fuel as opposed to just muscle power. And the most efficient products aren't always the cheapest to purchase. I can't afford to have any dryer but what I have, and hence I avoid using it as much as possible. Having no dryer will still be cheaper than having a dryer, no matter what sort it is. This still involves washing clothes. It's just the method of drying that could be different. There's no harm in encouraging people to go outside to do some light physical activity like this. I still can't see how it's unhygienic.

[stranoster]

Sure... Who cares about that energy when we could use a free alternative. I understand on rainy days but otherwise it is just laziness, especially if you have a heater on already inside. An airier or hills hoist washing line will do just as well and the sun and wind seem perfectly hygienic to me.

[pickford78]

energy efficiant dryers even use high amounts of electricity. you can use a clothes hanger that will break once every 10 years and can be replaced for $20 plus save you large amounts of money in the summer. I use the pulley type of clothes hanger and we can get huge amounts of clothing on a line at a time. In Canada it is now illegal for sub-devisions to ban clothes lines in their policy.

[COMMODORE64]

Right you are, but n o it is not banned, but have serious health warning, due to bugs laying eggs in wet clothes. But if you build a cute bugscreen outside just for drying clothes, then yeah i guess you could do that. Would you like to have a live maggot eating your skin while you are working? That's a consequence for leaving clothes outside to dry out. Oh! and, when drying clothing outside, the clothes gets little stiffy.

[pfox82]

Umm... not everywhere in the world has "skin eating maggots"....

[COMMODORE64]

Of course. I was mistaken on my post, and found out the hard way of doing laundries at the cottage. I take it all back, but my point remains valid, it does get stiff, but its necessary to rub the clothes together to restore the softness on clothes. Beside, this is a old thread now.

[pickford78]

I put my clothes on straight from the line, that makes them soft.

[gearskin]

 Maggots do not eat live skin. I think it's a valid tip, if you have an energy efficient  dryer awesome, but if you want to do more and have no problem with hanging your clothes, even more awesome. You could also hang a line in a basement. If you have a basement with a drain, you can hang a line down there and the clothes will dry AND help keep your house cool in the winter. They will humidify your house. For water to go into a gaseous state it requires heat, so (not by a ton) but it will suck heat from the air, leaving it cooler, a real plus in the summer.

[gearskin]

 I meant in the summer... wow... lol

[=spider=]

I'm not sure why you say doing your teeth quickly helps. Do you mean if people leave the tap on while brushing? Shouldn't they just turn the tap off? I notice you've not put the old "if it's yellow let it mellow" jive on here. I'm interested to hear people's thoughts on it as I'm undecided whether it's effective enough to justify itself. You know what I mean: flush only for number 2s...

[stranoster]

Probably just phrased it badly. I meant to say turn off the tap, but I was half asleep when writing this. I will change it next time I edit the instructable. Thanks.

[=spider=]

hehehe... no problem. I thought that's what you meant. :) but I had to be sure in case I was missing something.