VISTA, CALIF.—Surprisingly, one area often overlooked as a facility becomes greener and more sustainable is the restroom. Yet more water is used in restrooms than virtually any other area of a facility, and because water and energy are interconnected, water consumption increases the amount of energy necessary to power a facility.
In addressing this issue, Klaus Reichardt, CEO and president of Waterless Co Inc., offers the following suggestions to make commercial restrooms greener and more sustainable:
• Lighting: Restroom lighting is often on 24 hours a day. Install motion sensors to turn off lights when the restroom is not used.
• Lightbulbs: Replace conventional lightbulbs with energy-efficient lighting.
• Cleaning: Virtually all cleaning chemicals used for cleaning restrooms now have certified-green equivalents; use only green cleaning chemicals and products.
• Water faucets: Install sensors. Studies indicate sensors that turn water on only when needed can reduce water consumption by as much as 70 percent.
• Hand dryers: A public restroom used by 200 people a day may use enough paper towels to fill a six-foot-tall grocery sack. Provide hand towels or electric hand dryers to eliminate this waste.
• Fixtures: Install fixtures that surpass current federal mandates. Some new toilets use 1.28 gallons of water per flush, and no-water urinals save thousands of gallons of water per year per urinal.*
• Recyclables: Station recycling bins in restrooms. Many paper products used in restrooms can be recycled.
• Leaks: Search for leaks and fix them. Just one intermittent dripping faucet can waste three gallons of water per day, a total of 1,095 gallons a year.
“Restrooms are highly visible areas,” adds Reichardt. “A green and sustainable restroom shows a facility is doing more than talking green; it’s making green and sustainable part of the way it does business.”
*Current federal regulations require that toilets use no more than 1.6 gallons of water per flush and urinals about 1 gallon per flush.
