Maintaining your home’s plumbing may be something you only pay attention to when you’re dealing with a catastrophe: your toilet is spraying water at you, your shower won’t turn on when you need to get ready for work, you need to find water heaters and it’s ten degrees outside. While an emergency plumbing service may be something you encounter, a good way to avoid such inconveniences is by regular maintenance. This article will detail things to look out for, and their impact should you choose to avoid them.
The most important thing to look out for are leaks. The average American home tends to use about 300 gallons of water per day, and approximately 10% of these homes have leaks that waste around 90 of them. That’s a lot of money (pardon the pun) down the drain! This can be easily avoided, though, if one knows where to look (or listen) for leaks. While it doesn’t hurt to check things like sprinklers, hoses, or water heaters, the two main culprits of water leaks are showers and faucets, as these are the most numerous and most-used water sources in the average home. A showerhead, with a drip rate of 10 per minute, will waste over 500 gallons per year–enough to wash 60 loads of dishes–and a faucet, dripping once per second, can waste much more, up to and over 3000 gallons! You could take 180 showers with that amount of water.
To better conserve water and save money on utilities, a simple examination of all pipes, with water running through them, should indicated whether a repair is needed. If you’re uncomfortable or feel like you’d rather enlist a professional, plumbing help is always available from nearby plumbing services. In addition to checking pipes, it is also recommended to drain and remove sediment from your water heater at least once a year.
While the task of maintaining your home’s water consumption and plumbing efficiency will greatly benefit you, the homeowner and bill-payer, it is also encouraging to know the widespread impact that you could create. An average of 1 trillion gallons of water, valued at $6 billion, is wasted every year because of leaks. This means that if every home was given proper attention and care, the impact could be immense on both our planet and our economy.
