RO System grey water recycling?

The Count

Well-Known Member
I live in colorado springs and water here is pretty expensive compared to where we moved from. We usually paid around $45 for THREE months back in syracuse NY and this included when I was watering 29 ladies about a half gallon every other day. I used an RO system and since water was cheap just sent the grey water down the drain. Well we just got our first months water bill here in the springs and it was $90 for ONE month and I havent even started really watering any ladies(seedling right now). Well anyways I bought the Hydrologic Evolution RO1000 even though it costs a pretty penny b/c this system come with an attachment for a 1/1 output over the 1/3 ration my old RO system put out. So I dont want to just send the grey water down the drain since I'm paying an arm and leg for it so I need to come up with a way to reuse the grey water. Anyone have any ideas? I'm just storing my "good" water in a new trash can with an air stone and will just do the same with grey water. I looked online to see what I can do with the water but most the input was for people using RO systems in their kitchen where you can just buy a pump to send the grey water to your washer or something. Unfortunately my grey water will be in a 15 gallon trash can. Anyone have any ideas on how to use the grey water efficiently?
 

halfloaf

Active Member
I am glad i live in Scotland our water is fucking awsome.

Man i pay about £200 a year for water that god pours from his own cup down over this country alll year round lol but you can maybe boil it ?
 

mackdx

Well-Known Member
I have a salt water well at my house (20 miles inland!) and run a whole house RO system for water. Just a couple of thoughts:

1) RO is a pretty inefficient process at the home owner level. Even if you run your grey water through an RO system, you will only be recovering a fraction of the water of the water and the rest will still go to waste. 100% recovery is impossible with consumer grade units - my best guess would be somewhere in the 50% (which I think you are predicting with the 1:1 ration specified on the Hydrologic Evolution RO1000. The unrecovered water still has to be disposed of.

2) It is slow - my system generates approximately 1 gal/minute so I have to have a 250 gal reservoir in my basement.

3) With grey water, I would be curious how much organic fouling you would get on the membrane. Once the membrane starts fouling (through either minerals/siltation or growth or organic materials (algae) you end up with a situation where production drops further and you have to maintain or replace the membrane.

4) What will the electrical cost of operation be to recover 1/2 of your grey water vs. the cost of the water? Here in my part of New England, electricity is expensive.
 
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