Appropos of nothing really. Last year Cheltenham had a green day where people who had done something environmentally sound to their homes and gardens opened them to the public so you could get ideas and information. It was really good and some places were quite inspiring. The best one I saw was a chap who had created a veg patch in his terraced house's back yard.
However one house we visited gave me pause for thought. They were about to install rainwater harvesting to flush their loos and suchlike, and as I'm interested in that I asked a few questions. The lady then asked me if I was on a water meter. I'm not so she said I'd be better off not bothering as I'd only increase my water company's profits. Which is kind of true but surely that's not the point? The point of rain harvesting is to reduce the amount of potable water we chuck away or am I missing something
Malc
High in the sky, what do you see ?
Come down to Earth, a cup of tea
Flying saucer, flying teacup
From outer space, Flying Teapot
Well yes and no, the point you're missing (and another reason I left the UK) is that the whole ethos of the UK for the last 40 odd years is FINANCE in big letters. Everything is driven by profit and now several generations of UK residents have grown up believing that profit is the be all and end all.
You on the other hand are just weird, how can you be so selfless
Is it not still the case that the water company "owns" the water in your water butt, and under hosepipe bans include piped water butts ?
Tony
Disclaimer: I almost certainly haven't a clue what I'm talking about.
I had a vague idea that the water companies own all the rainwater that falls so would technically own what is in your butt although I stand to be corrected on this one.
We had a meter fitted last year and so far our bills have been lower than before, roughly working it out something like in the order of 15-20% lower. The actual cost of the water is only really a small proportion of the costs though , most of it is sewage and standing costs .
You can , therefore , only save a bit with the rainwater harvesting which seems to tie in with odsox's comments about profits.
With regards to the hosepipe bans , the last time we had one we were told that we couldn't even drain the water from the bath with a hose as this would break the ban. Carrying it out in buckets was fine though.
You're charged by the water company for them accepting the rainwater from your roof into the sewer. They don't own the rain, but they do charge you to take it away. It's usually based on a percentage of your rates/meter reading.
However, if your rainwater system does not connect to the sewer (ie. 100% goes to water butts or soakaway, with no overflow connection to sewer) then you don't pay the water company that part of the bill. Quite a few people don't realise this, and the water company will assume your rainwater is going to sewer unless you prove to them otherwise.
The Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... sepipe-ban) advised that you could use a hosepipe connected to a water butt, "A hosepipe can be used for any purpose if it is connected to a grey water system or is using water collected from rainfall". And that is also my understanding.
Curently collecting recipes for The Little Book of Liqueurs..
There is a lot of misinformation about hosepipes and bans. You can actually still use hosepipes even if they're attached to the mains but not directly, ie you can fill watering cans with them rather than carry them all the way down the garden but you can't use them directly on the soil. This is not what the press will tell you though. Probably not a problem at the moment though but it always makes sense to save water.
A relative advised us strenuously against getting a water meter, as it would increase our bills. We'd just had one installed, and have subsequently seen our water bill drop quite a bit.
I think the point of water meters is to encourage us to use less (treated, piped) water. If the lady you were talking to had a meter, and was installing rainwater harvesting, that looks to me like the system was working.
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Rachel
Take nobody's word for it, especially not mine! If I offer you an ID of something based on a photo, please treat it as a guess, and a starting point for further investigations.
Yes but surely you would do rainwater harvesting for the benefit of the planet rather than because it's forced upon you because you have a water meter installed. Besides which there were only two of them in a socking big house. THey can't have used that much water could they?
Malc
High in the sky, what do you see ?
Come down to Earth, a cup of tea
Flying saucer, flying teacup
From outer space, Flying Teapot
You don't realise just how much water you can use if you are feckless with having a bath each night (and not sharing), washing up each set of plates as used, doing small amounts of washing in the washing machine ....
If rainwater harvesting is done for financial purposes so what? It achieves a green end without people thinking about it. It's like the rise in fuel prices encouraging people to use the car less.
I tend to agree with Flo . It would be a better world if we all acted with the planet's benifit in mind to our actions but the reality is that to most people "money makes the world go round" as someone sang. As long as the final result is the same then it's better than nothing.
Incidently in my earlier post I said we were saving around 15% . We have been on the meter almost a year now and have been given the option to continue or not , lokking at the figures it would seem the savings are nearer 30% on our bills so we are staying on the meter.
It is similar to comments I've read on another forum (mainly from Australians) who have installed solar panels. They make more per unit selling the electricity back to the company than it costs them to buy, so they produce solar electricity all day to sell back and then use electricity-guzzlers like washing machines, dishwashers etc at night on the cheaper electricity.
On average water bills are say £800 a year, this is £350 water and £450 sewage...ish
So if you don't use the water to flush, you save the cost of the water, PLUS you don't pay for your sewage, but you still use the sewage system.
I think it is this double "win" that financially speaking is the point.
But as you say, it's not really the point.
Conversely when you use your hose, or any mains water in the garden or to clean cars etc, you pay both the water and the sewage charge when you are not using the sewage at all.
Interestingly when I ran a factory we were allowed a certain amount of water a year where we did not pay effluent on it, as we used the water in recipes! Oh and commercially they test your effluent to see both how demanding of oxygen it is to break down and also how much this fluctuates, and it can get very very expensive! I installed a big interceptor and balancing tank and it saved us thousands of pounds a year.
This is a topic I knew more about than I should have shared really! Sorry.
Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.
Uller wrote:It is similar to comments I've read on another forum (mainly from Australians) who have installed solar panels. They make more per unit selling the electricity back to the company than it costs them to buy, so they produce solar electricity all day to sell back and then use electricity-guzzlers like washing machines, dishwashers etc at night on the cheaper electricity.
Again, not really the point!
What's wrong with it? - a kWh is a kWh. All they're doing is producing energy when there's greatest demand and shifting their own consumption to a slack period when demand is lower.
If you're uncomfortable with the concept of "profit" relating to green issues - why?
Curently collecting recipes for The Little Book of Liqueurs..
My family take pride in being thought of as odd. 
