An exciting purchase.

I have just bought something that I'm very excited about.  It was a pretty expensive purchase, and will come by courier, so I don't even get to 'play' with it yet.  I'm going to tell you what it is, and later (after it arrives and is set up), I'll also review it.  But first, I'm going to tell you the background of my purchase and why it is so exciting.

We live in a tiny 'town' in rural Victoria.  We have a regular sized block of land and neighbours, but we have to walk to a shop to pick up mail, drive a fair way to buy things and enjoy watching farm vehicles go by, hearing lots of birds, cows and chooks (ours included) in the mornings.  We have no mains gas, so are totally electric for the running of our home.  We have no mains water or sewage system, but instead rely on our own tank water, bore water and a septic tank.  Townies find this to be a scary sort of setup, but if you've lived in the country at all, you know that this is just a way of life, and, with a bit of luck, your setup is so good that you don't even have to think too much about it.

image

When we bought this place, we were lucky enough that it already had great water tanks that collect ample water from our (surprisingly) large roof.   We also had our garden taps connected to the bore pump of the school next door, so we were able to water our gardens and our animals, and even flush our loo with bore water instead of rainwater, and so we have always had the luxury of ample water to do as we need.  On top of this, we live in the one part of Victoria that was never put on water restrictions because we have been the lucky ones and received a decent annual rainfall each year.  Having said all of that, I'd like to point out that we've never been ridiculous with our water use.  We know that excessive use of bore water isn't ecologically great, and so we've always watered our garden enough, but let the lawns die over summer and only watered parts of the garden when it was essential.

So for the last 7 years, we've been blessed with a water input that meets our needs, but our output has been full our problems!  It turns out we have a very dodgy septic tank.  I dread to think how many dollars we've spent on repairs and maintenance - we've had it pumped out a couple of times, we've had a plumber do some unknown thing to it, and another plumber replaced the pump that no-one even knew should be in there!  It is also a strange setup.  Apparently septic tanks should have a grease trap between the water entry and the main storage tank.  We have a grease trap, but it is not in the right place and is actually an old Telecom pit which isn't at all right to be a grease trap.  I don't really understand septic tanks (sewage treatment plants I do - I used to take guided tours of one!), but what I do understand is that ours has problems that do not seem to be fixed by any amount of repairs. 

We've considered replacing the system with a more environmentally sensible system, but the financial outlay and the major disruption to the property are seriously off-putting.  And since our septic tank seems to work fine when much less water is being put into it, we were leaning towards making changes in our home to reduce the input to the tank, and had started researching how to do that.

Then we lost our bore water supply. 

We were cut off by the school by accident, and it seems that since the house is no longer owned by the department of education, we're not to be reconnected.  So now, with a full vegie garden and a yard full of fruit trees and animals that all need water, we had to come up with a plan that would enable us to keep up the water to everything that needs it using only our rainwater supply.  And this new problem, together with our septic tank problem, have led to some watery changes (and my purchase - getting to it!).

First, we started to collect greywater - the old fashioned way.  I have a large water container with a tap on it that I collect my washing machine water in and then deliver the water to each of my fruit trees in turn.  Thus saving about 20L from going into the septic a day, and also giving my fruit trees a boost.  We've also added a bucket to the shower.  This collects more than 10L of water a day which gets watered around the place.  We eventually also hope to add a grey water diversion from the bathroom to water some of my ornamental garden using a hose system.  So all up, we've already started reducing the water needed for the garden and the water going into the septic tank.

And today, I bought a waterless toilet.  I can't believe how excited I am about a toilet!  But a toilet that will not only save an estimated 80-100L of water a day, but will also take the pressure off of our septic tank.  The toilet system we've bought is a urine diverting system that collects solid matter and toilet paper in a bucket in the toilet that is then emptied into a separate composting system where it is left for 12 months (or more) before being able to be used as fertiliser around the garden.  You can collect the urine to use as a nitrogen rich fertiliser too, though we're opting to divert ours straight into the septic tank since we have the system there.  The toilet uses no water, though it does use a small amount of electricity to run a fan to ensure no smells or moisture build up inside. 


I have done countless hours of research into the best system for us, and found that there are quite a few waterless (or very low water use) toilets available in Australia.  Our requirements were quite specific though as we needed a unit that didn't need underfloor access (we have a low ground clearance).  This meant our choices were limited to only a few brands, many of which looked like giant versions of the old chemical portable toilets.  I'm sure these suit some, but we wanted ours to still look nice and not frighten visitors away.  So we made our choice - the Seperett 9000, from "A better way to go" - and I've ordered it and I'm really looking forward to getting it and installing the system.

The toilet we are getting.

Ahhhh.... the things we get excited about!  I promise to report back when we have installed it and used it for a bit with a full review.