Do-It-Yourself Laundry to Landscape Graywater Workshop in Sonoma Valley, Oct. 13-14

If you're looking for even more ways to conserve water (and who isn't) -- or you'd really, really (really) like to add a garden or landscaping but don't want to run more water, we wanted to let you know about a Do-It-Yourself Laundry to Landscape Graywater Workshop coming up in Sonoma. It's happening October 13-14 (Saturday and Sunday), and it's free to Sonoma Valley Residents.

Sponsored by the City of Sonoma's Water Conservation Program, the workshop is designed to teach you everything you need to know to transform your washing machine into a wondrous irrigation system for your yard.

Even though the workshop is free of charge, registration is still required - and space is limited so register today to reserve your spot!

http://sonomagraywaterworkshop.eventbrite.com/

Here are more details on the workshop:

READY TO GO GRAY?

Graywater that is. It's a perfectly wonderful, untapped resource that's easily and legally diverted to your garden, where it will make things flourish! Transition Sonoma Valley, in partnership with Daily Acts, the City of Sonoma and the Sonoma Ecology Center, is hosting a do-it-yourself, laundry-to-landscape workshop October 13 and 14.

During this weekend workshop you will learn about and install a system in your home.

You're a perfect candidate for this workshop if you:

• have a washing machine and a garden, and are ready for a do-it-yourself project
• have a washing machine and a garden, and a neighbor, friend or family member that will assist in installing a graywater system
• are interested in learning and can assist with an installation, but don't have an appropriate location for a system
• would like to save thousands of gallons of water a year and learn a new & easy way to make that washing machine do more than clean your clothes!



DETAILS

Who: Sonoma Valley residents that want to learn everything they need to know to install a laundry-to-landscape graywater system (Residents of other cities are welcome to join the training and volunteer with installations)

Why: You'll feel incredibly empowered after this hands-on weekend workshop and immediately reap the benefits of saving thousands of gallons of water, reducing irrigation demands and saving loads of time and money!

What: The first day is a full-day classroom-style lecture where you’ll learn plant selection, system design and plumbing skills to safely and confidently direct water from your washing machine to your landscape. Day two is a flexible, hands-on day where volunteers will be matched with a site, and Sonoma Valley residents will spearhead their graywater transformations at home. It will all be guided by our experts who will ensure proper code compliance, answer questions and offer helpful techniques to help you achieve your water saving goals. By the end of the weekend we’ll have collectively installed over twenty greywater systems complying with the new California state code adopted in fall of 2009. Let the graywater flow with gusto!

Materials and Tools: Each system will require a prescibed list of materials and some needed tools. Materials will be determined in advance during the site visits and will be available on the classroom day. City of Sonoma water customers will be provided the materials at no cost. (You will need access to some basic tools to do this installation. A suggested list can be found on the workshop webpage.)

For non City of Sonoma water customers, the materials will cost approximately $100 - $150. (The City is welcoming donations and sponsorships to offset these costs. If you would like to contribute, please contact Melinda Kelley.)

After you register you'll be contacted to discuss details and to schedule a site visit.

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Need more information? Contact Melinda Kelle at melbelkel@aol.com or (707) 938-7378.

And you can visit the www.trasitionsonomavalley.org web page for full details and links to more info.

Sonoma Community Center Dedicates Rainwater Catchment Tank

The Sonoma Community Center will be hosting a special little event from 10 to 11:30 a.m. this coming Saturday, June 9, to dedicate their new rainwater catchment tank.

Their rainwater harvesting system, which includes a 7,900-gallon tank plus water catchment and irrigation systems, is the product of a two-year collaboration between city, county and local partners including the Water Conservation Program of the City of Sonoma; the Sonoma County Master Gardeners; the Ellman Fund; the Sonoma Valley Groundwater Management Program, a broad-based stakeholder group with representatives from agriculture, dairies, government, water purveyors, business and environmental interests; the North Bay Watershed Association; the Sonoma County Water Agency; Boden Plumbing (that's us!); and Rainwater Harvesting Solutions.

For more information, visit the community center's web page for the event at ... Rain Tank Opening.

Sonoma Community Center
276 E. Napa St.
Sonoma, CA 95476
www.sonomacommunitycenter.org
707-938-4626

Rain Harvesting at Sonoma Community Center

In last week's post, we mentioned the new water tank at the Sonoma Community Center and said we really think it would be great to see more people harvesting and storing water in Northern California.

Well, we could have gone on to toot our own horn a little as it turns out. Here at Boden Plumbing we're so enamored of this kind of thing that we donated our help in getting the tank plumbed and primed to deliver water to the Center's beautiful garden and landscape. And this week we've got a few more pictures to share showing the guys at work.

Boden Plumbing trucks onsite at Sonoma Community Center,
near the new 8,000-gallon water storage tank.

Randy and Rudy scoping things out. (Yeah, Randy. It's kind of high.)

Looks like they opted to get started on terra firma first.

And then decided Randy would go up the ladder.
Chris, Casey, Rudy and Randy (left to right)

One company donated the tank and the drain that will bring water off the roof and into the tank. Waldron Landscaping provided trenching to get the water distribution lines where they need to be onsite, and then we laid the lines and got everything hooked up and functioning.

A small pump will push water through the system. During the dry part of the year, City water will keep the tank topped up. And then when the rain is falling, there is an overflow mechanism that will let any excess water drain away across the parking lot as usual. There is also a metering system that will allow the folks at the community center to monitor just how much water they are saving by storing and using the winter rains.

So a pretty cool set-up. There are still a few details to take care of before it's tested and fully functioning, but we'll be very interested to find out how it works out. Hopefully it will inspire other people to try rain harvesting and storage.

The Ancient Ingenuity of Water Harvesting

In this TEDIndia talk, Anupam Mishra talks about the amazing feats of engineering built centuries ago by the people of India's Golden Desert to harvest water. These structures are still used today and, as he explains, are often superior to modern water megaprojects.

New water tank at SCC

In an area that receives just nine or ten inches of rain a year and where the saline groundwater is 300 feet below the surface - too far to use solar power to pull it up even if it could be made potable - people have developed efficient ways to capture and store the water they need. Wouldn't it be great if site-specific water-harvesting became commonplace here in Northern California?

[Actually, that reminds us. Have you seen the new storage tank at the Sonoma Community Center? Really flashy. They'll be storing rain water captured from the roof and using it to irrigate the garden.]

So here's the story from India.



About the speaker:
Anupam Mishra works to preserve rural India’s traditional rainwater harvesting techniques as part of his effort to promote smart water management and ensure that every community is self-sustainable and efficiently safekeeping an increasingly scarce and precious resource.

He travels across India studying rainwater harvesting methods and learning from the people behind them. He presents his findings to NGOs, development agencies and environmental groups, pulling from centuries of indigenous wisdom that has found water for drinking and irrigation even in extremely arid landscapes through wells, filter ponds and other catchment systems.

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Find more great talks from TED at www.ted.com

Bill Gates Drifts Towards Arrakis in Quest for New Toilet

Bill Gates wants to reinvent the toilet and he's putting the considerable heft of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation behind the effort -- plus German taxpayers are kicking in $10 million to a joint project. According to a report we picked up from Time, "Over the next five years, this project aims to provide 800,000 people in Kenya with access to sanitation facilities and ensure clean drinking water for 200,000.

"The goal is to find "innovative solutions" for sanitation in poor urban areas. Gates says it's time to move on from the era of the classic toilet. He points out that, despite all the recent achievements, 40% of the world's population, or some 2.5 billion people, still lives without proper means of flushing away excrement. But just giving them Western-style toilets isn't possible because of the world's limited water resources."

photo credit: Sand Dunes by David Stanley

Shades of Dune, don't you think? But there's more...

The engineer who heads the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene department at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Frank Rijsberman, is presently working on two projects. With one project, the foundation supports the construction of pit latrines in rural areas and slums without sanitation facilities. With the other, it supports research projects, giving grants to scientists who come up with new ideas for using human excrement. He says there have been experiments to turn excrement into a kind of microwave that can be used as a source of energy.

Isn't that wild?

He says there are biological bacteria that could turn waste into compost, which sounds kind of old school to us, but he also talks about the possibility of toilets actually turning urine into drinking water. In view of the world's limited water resources, both the Gates Foundation and German Development Policy support various projects for dry toilets that do not use water to flush and that separate excrement from urine in order to dry it.

Another method put forward by the Gates Foundation in South Africa is using the urine of 400,000 people to make nitrogenous fertilizer in powder form. A similar albeit high-tech variation is currently being tested by the Society for International Cooperation in Eschborn, Germany. The importance of this research is not always easy to explain, says Rijsberman, because anything having to do with human waste provokes a "yuck factor."

Necessity may be what ultimately overrides the yuck factor. As potable water supplies continue to dwindle relative to demand, we'll see how close we come to Frank Herbert's vision in Dune.

"The Fremen also have complex rituals and systems focusing on the value and conservation of water on their arid planet; they conserve the water distilled from their dead, consider spitting an honorable greeting, and value tears as the greatest gift one can give to the dead. The novel suggests that the Fremen have adapted to the environment physiologically, with their blood able to clot almost instantly to prevent water loss." [Dune (novel) on en.wikipedia]

see:
A Human-Waste Gold Mine: Bill Gates Looks to Reinvent the Toilet from Worldcrunch at www.time.com.

Lobby for Rainwater Capture in California

AB 275, the Rainwater Capture Act of 2011 makes it legal for all Californian’s to capture rainwater, thus decreasing stormwater runoff, increasing groundwater infiltration, and offsetting unnecessary potable water use for things like landscape watering. Wholly H2O, which helped craft the bill, considers this legislation a no brainer for California, a state whose water sources and their ecosystems are over taxed and under cared for.

Yet, there are bill opponents talking directly to the Governor and asking him to veto the bill. It would be great if as many people as possible contacted the Governor to request a signature. You can support AB 275, Rainwater Capture Act of 2011 by writing Gov Brown before October 8th.

Governor Jerry Brown
c/o State Capitol, Suite 1173
Sacramento, CA 95814

Phone: (916) 445-2841
Fax: (916) 558-3160

Or you can go to his website – www.gov.ca.gov – where AB 275 is listed as an issue in a drop-down menu.

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"We're probably known around the universe as that really noisy blue planet where everybody pees in their water." -- Will Durst

Gray Water Systems for Sonoma

Gray water systems can be as simple as a rain barrel collecting and saving roof runoff or as complex as a system plumbed to code that separates out bath, sink and shower water for outdoor landscaping. As varied as they are, all gray water systems have one thing in common: they are designed for more efficient use of potable water.

California's Health and Safety Code, Section 17922.12, defines graywater as “untreated wastewater that has not been contaminated by any toilet discharge, has not been affected by infectious contaminated or unhealthy bodily wastes, and does not present a threat from contamination by unhealthful processing, manufacturing, or operation wastes. 'Graywater' includes but is not limited to wastewater from bathtubs, showers, bathroom washbasins, clothes washing machines, and laundry tub". It does not include wastewater from kitchen sinks or dishwashers.

The average family of four produces more than 38,000 gallons of gray water per year, according to John Russell, a landscape contractor and owner of WaterSprout, an Oakland design-build company focusing on gray water and rainwater catchment systems. (See gray water article in San Jose Mercury News.)

That's a significant amount of water, and considering how much summer water use goes to outdoor irrigation, the potential for reducing overall water consumption by reusing gray water to water lawns and other landscaping is equally significant.

Fortunately, Sonoma County recently implemented changes making it easier to legally install gray water systems in the County. The three types of graywater systems currently allowed in Sonoma County are:
1) Clothes washer system (single connection only)
2) Simple system (less than 250 gallons per day)
3) Complex system (more than 250 gallons per day)

BENEFITS of HOME GRAY WATER SYSTEMS

:: Reduces your potable water use up to 40%
:: Reduces your water bill
:: Reduces the County’s energy consumption when less water needs to be processes and transported
:: Reduces demand on Russian River and groundwater sources
:: Helps protect water resources for future generations

THINGS TO CONSIDER

:: Graywater may contain pathogens
although researchers have found no documented cases
:: Systems that pond may provide breeding grounds for mosquitos
ponding is avoided with proper mulch basins
:: Salt accumulation may inhibit plant growth
use biodegradable soaps exclusively
:: Unfiltered systems accumulate solids and may clog system
be careful what you send down the drain or include a filter in your system
:: Minimal contact with graywater is recommended
water is diverted outside and underground
gray water is not permitted for use on above ground veggies or root crops
:: When ground is saturated, graywater must be diverted to site’s sewer disposal
simply switch your system off during the winter rainy season

INTERESTED IN HAVING A GRAY WATER SYSTEM AT YOUR HOUSE? FOLLOW THESE BASIC STEPS*:

1) Educate yourself on the design, installation, and maintenance requirements for a graywater system
2) Design your system or hire a licensed designer/contractor to design your system
3) If required, submit appropriate permit(s) and plan(s) to the local enforcement agency (see contact details listed below)
4) Install your system, obtain required inspection(s), and final permit
5) Maintain your system

*excerpted from Sonoma County's gray water systems brochure



For more information about gray water and Sonoma County, visit the Sonoma County Water Agency's web site at www.scwa.ca.gov/graywater

For more information about installing a gray water system at your home or business:
Unincorporated areas of Sonoma County: Visit PRMD on the web
City of Sonoma: Call 707-938-3681
City of Petaluma: Call 707-778-4301

Interested in reading more about gray water systems in the Bay Area?
See: Gray water systems growing in popularity, ingenuity and ease of installation, in the San Jose Mercury News

photos: Vianney Soto on flickr.com

Gray Water Options in Sonoma County

While our dogs (and some cats) will on occasion drink out of the toilet, it's not something people tend to do. Which does make you wonder why we use fresh potable water to fill and flush the bowl.

Something else well worth thinking about is why that same drinking water when used at the kitchen sink or in the shower is only used once.

It's not like we have an unlimited supply of the stuff.

According to a recent report in the Los Angeles Times, "Widespread recycling of gray water could cut residential water use by 16%, according to one estimate." That's not an insignificant amount of water savings.

The article goes on to say that, "During a prolonged drought in the early 1990s, L.A.'s Department of Water and Power and Department of Public Works conducted an ambitious experiment. In eight homes, including those of several elected officials, they installed "gray water" equipment that diverted the outflows from washing machines, showers, bathtubs and bathroom sinks to irrigate lawns and gardens outside the homes.

"Participants in the program were happy with the results, and the test was officially proclaimed successful in a 21-page research report that found the installations reduced water consumption by about 50% per household on average. No human disease pathogens were found in the outside drainage areas."

That was then, what about now? California is facing another set of drought years, and demand for water has only increased since the early 1990s. And yet gray water systems don't seem any more common now than they were before Los Angeles conducted their study.

It's the regulations. State health and housing officials were asked in 1992 to come up with regulations and permitting requirements to allow for installation of gray water systems. Unfortunately, what resulted is so impractical and expensive that few legally permitted gray water systems have been built. Appendix G of the state plumbing code requires that gray water systems get costly permits, have extensive filtering systems and that they be installed 9 inches underground -- too deep to irrigate most plantings. It seems that concerns about groundwater pollution and disease transmission are what drove the restrictive requirements.

Bottom line for Sonoma County? Aside from rainwater catchment and storage, recycling water at home is limited to capturing your shower, tub and washing machine outflow for use as outside irrigation water -- when the underground distribution system is well below grade. No above ground watering.

Fortunately, State officials are taking another look at the California gray water regulations. More information on possible changes should be available in June. Arizona, Texas, New Mexico and Montana are already ahead of us on this one. Maybe we can learn something from their example.

Contact us here at Boden Plumbing with questions. (info@nodrips.com or 996-8683) We've recently learned about a new gray water recycling system out of Canada that looks promising --- although we haven't tried it ourselves yet. It routes gray water from shower, tub and laundry to a holding tank and then feeds it back into the system to flush toilets. It's called Brac Systems. You might want to check it out.

:: Info on graywater
:: California Graywater Guide
:: more info on graywater and ecological design
:: NRDC Onearth article



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Boden Plumbing primarily serves Sonoma Valley, Napa Valley, and the Petaluma area. We provide a full range of residential plumbing repairs and services.
866-663-7477
www.nodrips.com

When Gray is Green

(from Using Graywater in Your Home Landscape Graywater Guide, California Department of Water Resources, January 1995)

Tired of watching your bath and laundry water go down the drain when it could be put to good use on your landscape? Did you know that it's safe - and legal - to reuse that "graywater"?

In addition to conserving water and probably reducing your water and sewer bills, you will also be drought-proofing your landscape by using graywater. Since more than half of your indoor water can be reused as graywater, during shortages, when outdoor watering may be restricted, you will have a constant source of water. With landscapes valued at between 5 percent and 10 percent of the value of a home, this back-up supply of water may be an important economic insurance policy for you.

Graywater is distributed subsurface and can be used to efficiently maintain lawns, fruit trees, flowers, shrubs and groundcovers. The type of plants it can not be used to irrigate is vegetables (i.e. your edible plants).

Find out more about graywater at the links below. Or contact us here at Boden Plumbing to find out about the options for your home. info@nodrips.com or 996-8683

:: Info on graywater
:: California Graywater Guide
:: more info on graywater and ecological design
:: NRDC Onearth article