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 »  Home  »  water  »  Green washing up
Green washing up
By Green Living Tips | Published  11/18/2006 | water , home , cleaning
Earth friendly washing up tips
Washing up is a chore we all love, right? :)

Unfortunately, it's also a chore that can be decidedly unfriendly to the environment on a number of levels. Here's a few tips to make your washing up duties a little more earth friendly:

1. I've been guilty of this often myself; rinsing off a plate for whatever reason - you can use litres of water in a short space of time just trying to wash a bit of gunk off. To help cut down on wastage from this sort of activity, short of not doing it at all; you may want to consider an aerator which can help give the stream of water coming out of the tap a bit of oomph, but using less water to do so. Somewhat unrelated, but an aerator can help make your water taste a little better too - the addition of air bubbles into water helps get rid of a "flat" taste.

2. Detergent use. Aside from using a phosphate free detergent from a recyclable bottle; only use enough detergent to cover the surface with a fine layer of suds - anything more is just overkill.

3. Hot water temperature. If you find you have to add a lot of cold water after adding hot, it means that your hot water system is set too high. Your hot water system should be at a temperature so that the water doesn't start scalding your skin when in contact for 5 seconds. There's really no point to having it set any hotter. By reducing your hot water service temperature, you'll save energy, save money and have just that little bit less impact on the environment. You'll also reduce the risks of scalding accidents.

Have some green washing up tips? We'd love to read them, please add your comments below.

 
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Michael Bloch
Green Living Tips.com
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Comments
  • Comment #1 (Posted by redfyn)

    About the water temperature: I have often seen this suggestion, to keep the hot water tank at about 120 degrees. But someone told me that if it's 120, you can take a shower or run a bath with all hot water, and it's comfortable, but if it's set at say 140, you use LESS hot water when you run the cold with it, so the water in your hot water tank lasts longer. Especially, for example if numerous people are taking showers in the morning, higher hot water temp will let the hot water last longer.
     
  • Comment #2 (Posted by Michael (Green Living Tips))

    Thanks for your comment redfyn. You have a good point about multiple people needing to take a shower and emptying the tank - makes for good motivation to conserve water and take shorter showers :)
     
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