Bathroom remodeling doesn’t just have to be about updating the current look of your bathroom or improving the usability. It can be a great chance for you to implement some ways to conserve water and energy, while also choosing attractive yet environmentally-friendly options to remodel your bathroom. Remodeling your bathroom while being environmentally-friendly at the same time is entirely possible. We’ve put together some great green bathroom remodeling tips that you can consider when planning your bathroom remodel.
As might be expected, your bathroom uses a lot of water, mainly for the toilet and shower. However, it is possible to reduce that figure by a significant margin which can mean your water bill shrinks as a result. The major culprit in bathroom water consumption is of course the toilet, which accounts for a quarter or more of a household’s water usage. Installing a low-flow toilet probably won’t help this, since they can often end up using more water than before due to requiring multiple flushes. However, a dual-flush toilet is an excellent alternative that allows you to minimize the amount of water used per flush – it allows you to choose whether you want to use a minimal amount of water or the maximum amount of water when flushing. As a result, a dual-flush toilet can save as much as 17,000 gallons per year. If you don’t want to replace the toilet entirely, your current toilet can also be upgraded to allow dual flushing.
When it comes to the shower, it generally does not use as much water as the toilet does, but it still accounts for 15-20% of a household’s water usage. You can cut back on this by installing a low-flowing showerhead, which uses 1.5 to 2 gallons per minute, as opposed to a high-flowing showerhead that uses 2.5 gallons per minute.
Choosing environmentally-friendly materials for your bathroom remodel is another way to go green but still have a great-looking bathroom in the end. Ceramic is a very popular green material for bathroom tiles that is attractive, durable and low-maintenance, while tiles crafted from recycled glass are also very environmentally friendly and attractive as well. Replacing light fixtures with LEDs will help save on energy costs over the long run since they use a very minimal amount of energy but can still output a good deal of light.
In addition to green remodeling materials and water-efficient fixtures, you can reduce your bathroom’s energy costs to help save money and minimize environmental impact. Your water heater can be wrapped with an insulator that helps reduce the amount of energy it needs to heat water and you can also insulate any exposed pipes connected to the water heater. It can also be a big help to turn the temperature down to 120 degrees from the standard 140 degrees a water heater is usually set at – this will still provide hot water but use less energy in the the time comes to replace your water heater, you have two excellent alternatives to a standard water heater. With a condensing water heater, almost all of the energy used goes to heating water – maximizing energy-efficiency. The other option is a tankless water heater, which heats water on demand, rather than using energy to keep water hot constantly.