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Home Greywater System

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English: Photos from October 6, Day 21 of Occu...


Greywater as you may know is the wastewater from your shower, bath, kitchen sink, hand basins, laundry tub, washing machine and dishwasher. It doesn’t include any water from toilets. I think we are all becoming more aware of the potential ecological benefits of greywater recycling here in the Blue Mountains. Including:

▪                Water for irrigating plants  and a saving on water bills

▪                Lowering fresh water extraction from ground water

▪                Stopping the extreme load of wasted water going to the Winmalee  Sewage Treatment Plant and the creek line below; or just to septic tanks in areas like Medlow Bath

▪                Reduced energy use and chemical pollution from treatment

▪                Some increase nutrification into our depleted soils

▪                Recharge of our many local aquifers and endangered swamp communities

and more I’m sure…

The juggling of recycling the water from my family’s bath, shower and washing machine has taken many forms over the last 20 years, it’s not just install once and forget, when the family’s water usage changes, you want to be able to adapt. You also want to deal with nasties pragmatically. There are some chemicals its kinda hard to avoid, whether it’s the dregs of hair dyes from teenage girls or the possible watery residue of chemotherapy.  Being able to switch the system over to mains let’s you filter and process easy contaminants that break down easily, but divert back to the main system when you need additional capacity which the mains sewerage has to treat these extra unavoidable pollutants.


As you might expect, every State in Australia has its own rules. For the Blue Mountains the NSW Office of Water suggests the following:

Use Description Requirements
Manual bucketing Small quantities of greywater are captured in a bucket for reuse outside on gardens or lawns No council approval required
Diversion Greywater diversion devices redirect greywater for use outside the home on gardens or lawns using sub-surface irrigation No council approval required under certain conditions. Needs a plumber to install
Treatment Greywater treatment systems for reuse inside the home (eg toilet flushing, washing machine) as well as outside on gardens or lawns Council approval is required. Needs a plumber to install

My two arrangements are diversion systems. The first distributes water from my washing machine to my orchard, which is perfect my my few fruit trees.

So how does it work? Well  the pump from the washing machine directs water to an olive barrel, where it collects for not more than 3 hours when it is again pumped (this time by a small submersible pump) and transported through a typical polypipe irrigation system onto the tree roots.

The second is a little more complex and uses the water from the bath and shower.  It too is collected in a tank with the water pipes being intercepted through a soft rubber funnel that I bought from the hardware. This water is released by gravity feed through a hoses and a number of ½ terra cotta pipes filled with gravel. This allows UV radiation to clean the water as it trickles along to 3 drainage pits that are inter-connected like a reed bed system. The first container holds charcoal, the second gravel and azolla, whilst the third contains sand and some reeds. Frogs spawn all along the system, so I’m assured it is not environmentally friendly.

Every few years I clean it out and start again…the last time was during out Autumn PDC. Many hands do indeed make light work.

http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/watersaving/greywater.htm for lots of helpful information and contacts

Find out the whys and wherefores of water saving and repurposing in your permaculture life with local water systems expert Michelle Maher in our upcoming Spring Part Time PDC – be quick, the course starts in just 2 weeks time on Friday 5th October continues Fridays and Saturdays for six weeks.



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