Tucson, Oro Valley, Marana
Get Serious About Saving Water
If you want to get serious about saving water resources you should
- require a GFCI outlet under the sink for the location furthest from the hot water heater so an inexpensive recirculating system could be installed easily.
- require the installation of a hot water recirculating system. Yes it could cost more but more than going from $200 hookup fee to over $5000?
- I’m sure you have some regulation against the smaller units you plug-in. Well you make the regulations. Change it, if it exists.
Here are the Tucson home design examples.
There is a significant number of homes that do waste a lot of water by locating the hot water heater in the garage and the master bath at the very back of the home.
I already talked about this in the post Tucson Water Recirculating Systems.
I’m not going to single out the builder because there are many builders here doing this kind of design.
You can see the hot water heater is in the garage while the Master bath and kitchen are at the back of the home. At least the washing machine will get hot water quickly. Now how much water do you think goes down the drain waiting for hot water to the Master sinks and shower?
The Commons Townhomes on Allen Road
The Commons Townhomes are what I consider to be a water conservation design.
All of the models have a centralized water supply system. Here is the 1581 model floor-plan It is consistent with the layout of the other models when it comes to the location of the hot water heater.
I know this type of design isn’t possible in all situations and locations. If not, then require wiring and installation of hot water recirculating systems.
Tucson New Home Buyers
Be sure to request a recirculating system be installed in your new home. At the very least have a GFCI outlet installed under the sink of the hot water sink located furthest from the hot water heater. You can then install a recirculating system yourself once you move in. It isn’t hard especially with the outlet already in place. See the post on Tucson Water Recirculating Systems.
We all contribute to the issue of water in our community. Do we contribute by conserving water or by wasting it?
In my home we waste 4 gallons waiting for the kitchen sink hot water to get from 70 to 90 degrees. That’s 6400 BTU. It would be nice if Richmont had built in a recirculator but they didn’t and it’s not feasible to install it. What would be nice would be a booster that electrically heated the hot water until we get it from the gas heater. But the amount of amps to do this exceeds the usual 15A service under the sink.
Anyone with ideas, please contact me at qneidich@comcast.net