Water Tank - should I bother, with Desalination coming?

Hello All. I'm thinking about installing a tank for the toilet/washing machine, to do our bit to help Victoria's dismal rainfall. Just a few questions:

-what size tank would you recommend for a two person water smart household ? I'm looking at a 9000Litre tank(biggest that will fit down driveway). (I already have a tank for the garden)is that overkill?

-The Victorian Governments desalination plant will be online in 2011. So there trying to get us to cut our water use now. But in 2011 we'll all be encouraged to install fountains/pools/hose driveways with the abundance...So for the outlay of $7K I'll have to pay to get my built in gutters ripped out and re plumbed + tank is it all worth the effort?

cheers

Paul

From a sustainability point of view, it is always better to avoid a problem than trying to fix it afterwards, so fitting a tank is a better solution than relying on a technological fix later. If it cuts down on your water use, then you will need to use less water cleaned and transported by someone else.

Of course whether you think its worth the effort and cash is a different argument!

If you think that the government is going to spend all that money on the plant and leave the water rates low, you might be in for a surprise.

I'd put the tank in.

woodbe.

Paul, we have a galv-iron 9000 litre tank, and put it in new just over thirty years ago. We use it for drinking, and have one of those plastic filters that sit on the benchtop which we top up through the course of the day. I note that two of us with a couple of "drop-ins" manage to drink upwards of nine litres a day in coffee and tea as well as glasses of water. The filter does not kill bacteria but is supposed to take out heavy metals to a degree, as well as solids. We have never had a "Belly Bug" from the water, but each roof differs, with cats or possums as well as too many pigeons or doves dropping the business up there. Dead vegeatation causes sludge and slime as well.

A tank that big will not supply your toilet and through a long drought, let alone your washing machine. My 9000L tank has left room for only pedestrian traffic either side of it in a driveway. This is much bigger than a lot of household tanks, and so it's up to you, but you will need to have a proper pump rigged up to it, on a real good pump stand. This should be thought about carefully, as the good ones are self-priming. The toilet can feed from gravity, but the washing machine needs to be working hard on wash day, and SWMBO will become annoyed at having to wait. Not even sure if gravity will work on Auto washers . . they may rely on pressure to switch their taps on and off.

Twin tub washers are another story, and the "Laundry Person" will have to stand and watch the tub fill, in order to manually turn off the tap.

All said and done, you can save paying for one helluva lot of water over the course of a year. Make sure every drop off of your roof is fed into the tank, with overflow piped out into the street.

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Originally Posted by Buzza

All said and done, you can save paying for one helluva lot of water over the course of a year. Make sure every drop off of your roof is fed into the tank, with overflow piped out into the street.

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... with overflow piped onto your garden....:U

Get the tank. Think about more tanks.

1: You can bet on the Govt. (or whoever they sell the Water Board off to) will increase the price of drinking water dramatically. The 'desalination' plant will probably be powered with diesel pumps - fuel will go up & up & up. Any assurances about prices are just hot air.

2: If you have your own tank/s, you won't have to worry about broken water mains & such. In the event of a bushfire threatening your property, the firies can use your water tank to try to save your property - mains water often fails in bushfires due to high demand.

3: It will all cost more tomorrow.

Thank you all for your replies, we're now definitely sold on the water tank idea. We were 95% sure. I plan to install it all correctly, later, after its filled up enough to be of any use. If I could fit a bigger tank down the 2.3m wide driveway I'd do it, as I have plenty of space out the back. I could hire a crane. We are thinking about about trying to future proof ourselves, this should help.

cheers

Paul

A. (Get a water tank) + B. (Claim the rebate.) = C. (Council raises rates for water storage.)

A. (Get a water tank) - B. (don't claim the rebate.) <> C. (Council does not raises rates for water storage, unless they find out.)

Groggy, What the?

A lot of BIG tanks are less than 2.3 meters high so get a biggie and roll it into your backyard

We looked at plumbing a 2500lt tank to toilet and laundry but in the end the expense wasn't worth it. We still got the tank but will use on vegie garden, kiddies pool, washing paint brushes etc. We are water wise with a front loading washing machine and water wise toilets and we don't flush all the time. We all bath together 3 times a week so for a house with two adults and two toddlers we use around 300lt per day of water, but that usually includes some water for the vegie garden in dry times.
It's a pity that we continue to be the one's who keep trying to improve our use, yet I have seen families on that Carbon Cops TV show with 2 adults, 3 teenagers in a house using 1,700lt of water per day!!!!!
We felt for the cost of the pump (using power!) and connection and our already little use of water that it was best not to connect. Use the money on mulch, compost bins etc.
Cheers
McBluter

I can see where Groggy is coming from - will the council/water authority decide, at some future date, to institute a levy on water tanks in order to pay for their overpriced & under utilised de-sal. plants?

I remember that some Electricity suppliers were charging a levy on solar hot water systems installed on rural properties a few years ago, and again, in rural areas farmers have been hit with 'levies' on their dam capacity - after being encouraged to increase on-farm capacity. I wonder if those same farmers have launched an action for damages against the water authorities for failure to deliver sufficient water to their farms?

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Originally Posted by rhancock

Groggy, What the?

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If you claim the rebate for the water tanks your rates go up - so I am told (by a number of people from separate areas). Caution, possible urban legend.

Urban myth indeed.

My rates haven't gone up.

Anna Bligh specifically said she would not allow local councils to charge water storage rates on water tanks.

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Originally Posted by rhancock

Urban myth indeed.

My rates haven't gone up.

Anna Bligh specifically said she would not allow local councils to charge water storage rates on water tanks.

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Good on her! Since you're closer, would you mind telling her to get off her bum and come down to Victoria and stop it then? :rolleyes:

What the local government decides to do in the future who knows. They'll be wanting us to use heaps of de-sal when it comes on line.
I can't see much point of getting more water tanks, but the boss wants them.
We only use water for the equivelant of a one person household(just the two of us), which will drop even further with the demise of our toploader and the purchase of a over priced Miele frontloader, we have a 2700L tank for the vegie garden also.
The boss wants two 9000L tanks for the toilet and Laundry and another 2700 for the vegie garden. This should get our mains use right down. Is this overkill for suburban Melbourne?
Certainly overkill for the bank balance at $6500 for the tanks and pump, est. $5000 to get our in built gutters ripped out and re done to one spout. Then theres the $2500 for the frontloader. No change out of $14K, with the rebate of $900 paying only for a plumber, which will be charging guess how much, yes $900. So thats $15K it'll end up costing.
A bit for a mechanic and a nurse.

Hi Gravy,

Sad as it is you're right of course - whatever you do it'll be wrong (either for the boss, the bureaucrats or the pollies!)

However, if you take your thinking a bit further, and consider the sustainability of all your actions, rather than just focusing on water use, you get a slightly different viewpoint.

If your washing machine is buggered, then yes, buy a new, water efficient one, but if its not, then throwing it away and buyiung a new one will be more harmful environmentally than keeping it. It takes a lot of metal to make a new machine, lots of oil to transport it to you, etc. Same for your gutters, if its time to replace them, fair enough, but pulling out good gutters and downpipes is a waste of mineral resources, as much as hosing the drive is a waste of water resources.

I think the point is, when you have to replace or fix something, then you should consider the most sustainable way of fixing it, ie, what materials you use, what was involved in getting them to you, how they will be used, how long they will last for, how you will dispose of the ones you're throwing away, and the new ones when it comes time to replace them.

But I think that replacing stuff which still has useful life in it, on the basis of one measure of its use is suspect, unless there are very compelling reasons, eg, low water showers or and flushers, which are very small items. Electic hot water systems are probably on the borderline depending on how much you use them.

(Rant warning!) Unfortunately politicians find it more effective to focus on one issue at a time which needs fixing, and find it particularly useful to get the electorate to believe it is their own fault and they need to fix it themselves.