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Let water flow in bathroom faucets

mark handler

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Let water flow in bathroom faucets

Sacramento Bee

11/19/2014 4:00 PM 11/20/2014 12:00 AM

http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/soapbox/article4020588.html#storylink=cpy

The California Energy Commission will make a crucial mistake if it ignores a potential threat to the health and safety of Californians in favor of a proposal from investor-owned utilities.

With good intentions to conserve water and energy, the commission is considering a new, unprecedented regulation that would lower the flow rate for residential bathroom faucets to a maximum of 1 gallon per minute at a pressure of 80 pounds per square inch, and a minimum of one-half gallon per minute at 20 psi.

This proposed regulation reads like plumbing gobbledygook, but it’s not. It’s potentially dangerous to public health and would undermine sanitation and water conservation.

Marc Edwards, a professor of civil engineering at Virginia Tech, says that a growing body of evidence shows that low flow rates can increase the likelihood of pathogens growing in plumbing systems. “These concerns are not trivial,” he wrote to the commission. “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recently acknowledged that (such pathogens) are now the primary source of waterborne disease in the United States.”

Research has demonstrated that low flow is linked to an increased volume of stagnant water in pipes leading to the tap. This could provide ideal growth temperatures for waterborne pathogens, including ones that cause potentially fatal illnesses.

Further research has shown that low flows may not provide enough volume or turbulence to properly flush faucets, increasing sediment buildup and resulting in clogged bathroom pipes and higher plumbing expenses. In addition, low flows will increase the wait time for hot water.

The proposed regulation also undermines CALGreen building standards and the Environmental Protection Agency’s WaterSense program – two environmental initiatives that encourage consumers to purchase water-saving plumbing fixtures. Many faucets with the WaterSense label of approval would not perform as intended, discouraging consumers from buying them. Consumers have saved 757 billion gallons of water and $14.2 billion in water and energy bills since 2006 thanks to these products, according to the EPA.

The Plumbing Industry Leadership Coalition urges the Energy Commission to reject the proposal and move forward instead with a regulation that incorporates recommendations of its own staff, developed after consulting with stakeholders. This recommendation is a maximum flow rate of 1.5 gallons per minute at 60 psi and a minimum of 0.8 gallons per minute at 20 psi. Also advocating this proposal are the California Building Industry Association, East Bay Municipal Utility District, Inland Empire Utilities Agency and Metropolitan Water District of Orange County.

This proposal – in concert with other CEC staff recommendations for toilets, urinals and faucets – would result in savings of about 8.2 billion gallons of water, 24.6 million therms of natural gas and 169 gigawatt-hours the first year the standard goes into effect, according to the commission’s staff analysis. These water and energy use reductions equate to roughly $1.12 billion in savings to California businesses and individuals. In addition, the staff recommendations would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1.9 million tons a year.

Serious unintended consequences can result when ill-advised plumbing regulations are adopted without fully considering their impact on public health, plumbing systems and water use. The staff approach demonstrates that significant water and energy savings can be achieved without compromising health and safety.

Barbara C. Higgens is a founder of the Plumbing Industry Leadership Coalition and CEO and executive director of Plumbing Manufacturers International.
 
I don't know where she gets the 1gpm faucets, the last report I can find is dated April 2014 and it calls for what we already have, 1.5gpm @ 60psi and 0.8gpm @ 20psi. There must be a later report that I can't find.

What we already have doesn't make any sense at all:

On and after January 1, 2014, specified building alterations or improvements shall require non-compliantplumbing fixtures to be replaced with water-conserving plumbing fixtures.

On or before January 1, 2019, all non-compliant plumbing fixtures shall be replaced with water-conserving

plumbing fixtures throughout the building (regardless of whether property undergoes

alterations or improvements).
So what are you inspectors going to do on January 1, 2019, start going into everyone's home and citing them for non-compliant plumbing fixtures? Maybe it's time that citizens start arming themselves against building inspectors?
 
I will take the water guzzling non compliant water closet and install it in my home and let the homeowner use the low flow one. I found that after doing my business It often takes several flushes to successfully evacuate and clean the new bowls, so where is the savings?
 
In addition, low flows will increase the wait time for hot water.
Wait Time really. The same amount of cold water will go down the drain waiting for the hot no matter what the flow rate is. I turn on the hot and it takes about 90 seconds before the hot water arrives.

What goes down the drain returns to the ground through the drain field and back into the aquifer so what is the concern. Where is the water being consumed if it is just going back into the aquifer?

I assume public sewage systems may be different. What do sewage plants do with their treated water? I know a city in Fl that used it on the city orange tree grove.
 
In many parts of the country the water does not flow into a drain field and then into the aquifer. Rather it flows into rivers and oceans after being treated. This has resulted in depletion of aquifers and in some cases the lowering of the ground level, for example San Jose California.
 
Rather it flows into rivers and oceans after being treated
Why discharge it to a river or stream? How about into a lake or leach field type system so it is not carried away.

Then again if CA would stop removing their existing dams they may be able to replenish the aquifers over time.
 
\ said:
Then again if CA would stop removing their existing dams they may be able to replenish the aquifers over time.
The Sierra Club made us stop building dams to "save the fish" saying that nuclear power was the future. The Sierra Club was founded by John Muir who wanted to exterminate the "ugly feeble-minded Indians" to preserve the wilderness, it was later taken over by eugenics advocates like Stanford's first President David Starr Jordan who wrote books on eugenics.

\ said:
Under the sponsorship of the Sierra Club, Ehrlich advocated measures of economic coercion against people having children. He urged cutbacks on government programs of "death control," (i.e., public health). He also favored making foreign aid conditional on population control through that cherished creature of both the CIA and the environmental movement, the U.S. Agency for International Development. He advised the sterilizing of all Third World fathers of three children. In all this, Ehrlich was solidly within Sierra Club traditions as well as in agreement with Garrett Hardin, another hero of Malthusian environmentalism, whose mantra has been, "The freedom to breed will bring ruin to all." In 1949, Hardin noted in his hair-raising textbook "Biology: Its Human Implications," that "either there must be a relatively painless weeding out before birth or a more painful and wasteful elimination of individuals after birth."¹
The position of The Sierra Club was that the population should be controlled so there would be no more need for dams, but they have come to the realization that population explosion has become a reality and in the deal that was made in drafting our recent Prop 1 the Sierra Club has relented allowing more dams to be built.

Our current Science Czar, John Holdren has been a long time advocate of population control:

\ said:
Overpopulation was an early concern and interest. In a 1969 article, Holdren and co-author Paul R. Ehrlich argued, "if the population control measures are not initiated immediately, and effectively, all the technology man can bring to bear will not fend off the misery to come." In 1973, Holdren encouraged a decline in fertility to well below replacement in the United States, because "210 million now is too many and 280 million in 2040 is likely to be much too many." In 1977, Paul R. Ehrlich, Anne H. Ehrlich, and Holdren co-authored the textbook Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment; they discussed the possible role of a wide variety of means to address overpopulation. ²
¹ http://articles.latimes.com/1997/oct/02/local/me-38318

² http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Holdren
 
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