As a kid growing up in the desert, you’re aware how dire the water situation is and how we humans are making it worse. Around my college years my awareness and fear threshold went up even higher because I realised, wow, I’m part of the problem. I’m overconsuming water with everyone else.
It was a permaculture class that started to turn things around for me and showed me how I can help be part of the solution. It looked at how we can collaborate with natural systems, and it was then that I first heard about rainwater and greywater harvesting and decided to give it a go.
We have two homes on an eighth of an acre property in the desert community of Tucson, Arizona. My brother and his family are in one and then I’m in the tiny home right next door where I’ve been living for almost 30 years. In our monsoon season more rain falls on Tucson and our half million inhabitants than the city’s entire population consumes in municipal water within our homes.
We had more water than we needed falling for free from the sky, but you wouldn’t know because we just drain it away. Instead, we’re importing water from the Colorado River, 300 miles away, and pumping it up 3,000ft, using an enormous amount of energy and money. It makes you think: why are we wasting all this energy and water when rainwater is already here?
Initially I started off small. I created basin-shaped garden beds bordered by a raised path. As the rain hits the path, it drains into the garden and helps irrigate the plants. I then set up a tank to collect rainwater from the house roof for use in the garden during dry times. 15 years after that, I set up another rainwater tank to collect rainwater from a different roof and redirected it to my sink and shower, using it as my primary domestic water source. I’ve continued this process of collecting rainwater over the past 30 years, but I became curious to see how I could go one step further.
I started to think how I could use greywater, water that has only been lightly used in our sinks, showers, bathtubs and even air conditioners, as a source for irrigation. It feels like such a waste using virgin municipal water to irrigate the landscape when you think about all the energy we put into purifying water to that standard and delivering it to your home. We just put it right in the dirt – it’s insane.
I started with my washing machine. At the back there’s a drainpipe that sends the water straight to the sewer. I decided to add another pipe and direct it towards a tree in my garden. Then, every time I did a load of washing, I could just move the drain hose to the pipe that sends it to the tree and use this greywater for irrigation.
Air conditioning units also act as a great source to recycle water. In the hot and humid monsoon season a lot of people use air conditioners. All that indoor humidity and moisture from our perspiration and breathing gets drawn out by the air conditioning units, and that condensate just gets wasted and sent away to the sewer. Instead, we’re redirecting and recycling the air conditioning condensate for further irrigation.
The setup I’ve developed over the past 30 years has meant that 95% of all the water we now use to irrigate our garden and landscape is from free on-site sources. In an average year there’s about 11 inches of rainfall, and we harvest 100,000 gallons of rainwater and street runoff.
This means that as a household of four people we’re using less than 20 gallons per person a day of municipal water compared with about 100 gallons that a person would typically use each day. I’m saving a vast amount of money on my water bills just by using what’s freely on site.
Another great benefit is that it’s also much better for plant and soil life. You may have noticed that if you water your plants with rainwater, they often look much greener and healthier than they would if you used city water. This is because there’s no chlorine in the rainwater, instead it has all these natural microorganisms that act as free fertiliser.
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A similar effect occurs with greywater, where you’re getting a free fertiliser in the form of your dead skin and other stuff that sloughs off when you’re cleaning things. It’s this wonderful system of free fertilisation. You do have to be careful with what soaps and detergents you use though because they can be damaging to plant life – for example it’s better to use hydrogen peroxide bleach over chlorinated bleach.
There are always ways I can keep learning and evolving to refine my setup, but currently I’m really putting the bulk of my focus on trying to work with neighbours to create a community-wide shift. I appreciate it’s a different way of doing things and there’s this sense of inertia of like: Oh, I have to learn something new. But I hope that by sharing my personal experience and acting as an example I can show people how rewarding it can be to be a part of the solution, not the problem.
And there’s just so much joy I get from water harvesting. In every rainfall, I run straight outside to see the water flowing into our rain gardens and tanks, and to watch the vegetation erupt with vibrant new growth, blooms, and fruit.
With every shower and load of laundry I laugh as I know the water going down the drain is being directed to our plants and the trees that shade and cool me. I even giggle when I pee in the shower, knowing the nitrogen-rich urine is being beneficially directed to our soil and plantings as free fertiliser, while the shower greywater dilutes and rinses the urine, ensuring there is no odour.
I even find myself wanting to wash the dishes, and enjoy doing so, because I know the kitchen sink drain water provides free irrigation to fruit-bearing bushes and trees right outside the kitchen windows. I love the feeling and feedback I get from beneficially reciprocating to and collaborating with the living systems around me.