Shower saver

This week’s tip for saving money and water comes from our own backyard, at least figuratively, as Nicole “Java” Seaton is a regular contributor to this paper.

“You know those orange Home Depot buckets?” she asked. “And you know how you have to stand there for a minute and let the water warm up? Well, I shower with a bucket.”

Seaton’s idea is elegant in its simplicity. She simply allows the water to run into the bucket while it warms up. “Every day I save two and a half gallons of water,” she said. “It’s enough to water every plant in the house.” And since she’s using water that would have gone down the drain and not water especially drawn to nourish the plants, the savings is doubled.

Using the Truckee Meadows Water Authority’s charts to calculate the average cost of a gallon of water is nearly impossible, with its graduated charges, but the savings in water is substantial, around 1,825 gallons per year. Since the average home with a water meter uses 1,632 gallons per month, that’s more than a month’s worth of water saved.