Collecting rainwater requires little effort for many benefits. With your installation, you can reuse water from the sky at home and in the garden. The use of rainwater being strictly regulated, certain uses are possible and others not. Here’s how to reuse rainwater every day.
Rainwater: not everything is allowed
Despite appearances, rainwater is not drinkable. The water cycle recovers many polluting elements (chemical and bacteriological) in contact with the earth, materials and the atmosphere. Why would rainwater be the only unpolluted element on our planet? For everyone’s health, its use is strictly regulated. Outdoors, the use of rainwater is hardly a problem. But indoors, its use is limited by the decree of August 21, 2008 relating to the recovery of rainwater and its use. In addition to the chemical pollution linked to runoff, undesirable micro-organisms and parasites proliferate in this untreated water. It is impossible to use rainwater for drinking, cooking, washing up and personal hygiene.
In the garden, water is life!
Using rainwater in the garden sounds like a no-brainer. Your plantations already benefit naturally when it rains. But there are other possible outdoor uses, take advantage of them! For diversified outdoor use, provide a recovery tank of 600 to 3000 litres.
1 – I water my garden
No more need to use water from the drinking network for the plants in the garden. You can freely reuse rainwater to water your plants, including fruits and vegetables for consumption. Rainwater has the advantage of being softer than that extracted from groundwater. No limescale on your daisies; isn’t life beautiful? Not to mention that with a large garden, we appreciate the savings. Watering a garden consumes 15 liters of water per square meter… Do the calculation according to the size of your garden! This will be several thousand liters less per year on the water bill.
And in addition, the garden survives my absence! Yes, with a well-designed reuse of rainwater, forget about your garden with peace of mind… Find out about autonomous irrigation systems. Connected to your recovery tank, this type of network quietly feeds your plants, as long as the level of the tank allows it. It also helps your plants better handle the stress of a drought.
2 – I clean my terrace, my tools…
We always have a lot of things to wash outside. Gardening tools, garden furniture, the terrace… Might as well reuse rainwater for this kind of cleaning. If the bucket and mop aren’t enough, you can even fill your pressure washer tank with rainwater.
3 – I wash my car
Why use several tens of liters of drinking water to shine the bodywork of your car? Rainwater is more than enough to wash vehicles. And as it does not contain limestone, there is no risk of scratching the chrome of the Harley.
4 – I water my animals
Rainwater can be used to water your animals provided you remain vigilant. The quality of water stored in a recuperator can vary, depending on the temperature or the duration of storage. If your animals drink collected rainwater daily, be sure to clean the tank and the gutters regularly. Better to avoid any risk of bacterial poisoning. In any case, avoid giving unsafe water to a sick or fragile animal.
5 – I feed my ornamental pond
A pond is very beautiful, but it is greedy in water. Rainwater is more than enough to supply your pond. It poses no danger to aquatic fauna and flora. Fish and amphibians find nothing wrong with it.
6 – I fill my swimming pool
You can always fill your pool with collected rainwater. In the short term, it seems much more economical. But this is to forget that a treatment is necessary to lower the pH of the water and neutralize the bacterial contributions. Rainwater is much more acidic than that of a swimming pool intended for swimming. Do your count before filling the pool. That said, the water from your rain barrel can occasionally help stabilize the pool level during the summer.
7 – I have a permanent water supply
And this is not a detail when you live in a region subject to severe droughts. The presence of a water reserve outside the house can be useful in the event of a fire or fire. Similarly, rainwater collectors play an interesting role during periods of heavy rain. By collecting part of this rain, they reduce their discharge into rivers and sewers. Collecting rainwater thus contributes to the fight against flooding.
Inside, clean up
Since rainwater is unfit for consumption, it cannot be used for washing or cooking food, nor for washing up. No question of drinking it either, even in herbal tea. Forget the rain shower, it will save you problems. On the other hand, she is the queen of cleaning…
8 – I evacuate waste water from the toilets
You can perfectly fill your toilet with rainwater. All you have to do is connect the WC cistern with the rainwater collector. And if you’re not a handyman, do like your great-grandfather. Fill a pitcher with rainwater and empty it into the toilet bowl! The manual method works… but for the family, a little DIY will help. Again, you’ll appreciate the water savings on your bill. When you know that a single person consumes 14,000 liters of water a year just by flushing, there is something to think about.
9 – I clean the floors, the toilets…
You can brick the floors in your home with sky water. Imagine yourself brushing the tiles with this water falling from the clouds… Or how to transform cleaning into a moment of reverie. But let’s come back to earth: the cleaning of floors, walls, door frames, sanitary furniture, in short everything that can be cleaned in a house can be done with reused rainwater. And if baby is still eating everything he finds on the floor, do not hesitate to boil your rainwater before washing the tiles. Remember that rainwater is naturally demineralised. No lime deposits on the earthenware of the toilets or the tiles of the bathroom. Another advantage: less cleaning product is used with soft water. Save on all counts!
10 – I wash my laundry
If you can use rain water for washing machine? Yes, but ! Linen touches skin, doesn’t it? It is therefore necessary to take some precautions to avoid any bacterial contamination. If you want to wash your clothes as a family, the law requires you to treat the water in the recovery tank using a suitable device.
In total, half of the drinking water you use every day can be replaced by rainwater collected by you. And we’re only talking about home use here. It is obvious that public authorities can, on a larger scale, reuse rainwater to water green spaces or supply an ice rink…