Greywater is water from your bathroom sinks, showers, tubs, and washing machines. It is not water that has come into contact with feces, either from the toilet or from washing diapers.

Greywater may contain traces of dirt, food, grease, hair, and certain household cleaning products. While greywater may look “dirty,” it is a safe and even beneficial source of irrigation water in a yard. If released into rivers, lakes, or estuaries, the nutrients in greywater become pollutants, but to plants, they are valuable fertilizer. Aside from the obvious benefits of saving water (and money on your water bill), reusing your greywater keeps it out of the sewer or septic system, thereby reducing the chance that it will pollute local water bodies. Reusing greywater for irrigation reconnects urban residents and our backyard gardens to the natural water cycle.

The easiest way to use greywater is to pipe it directly outside and use it to water ornamental plants or fruit trees. Greywater can be used directly on vegetables as long as it doesn’t touch edible parts of the plants. In any greywater system, it is essential to put nothing toxic down the drain–no bleach, no dye, no bath salts, no cleanser, no shampoo with unpronounceable ingredients, and no products containing boron, which is toxic to plants. It is crucial to use all-natural, biodegradable soaps whose ingredients do not harm plants. Most powdered detergent, and some liquid detergent, is sodium based, but sodium can keep seeds from sprouting and destroy the structure of clay soils. Chose salt-free liquid soaps. While you’re at it, watch out for your own health: “natural” body products often contain substances toxic to humans, including parabens, stearalkonium chloride, phenoxyethanol, polyethelene glycol (PEG), and synthetic fragrances. (to learn more about what’s in your products, go to the Cosmetic Database and see how they rate for toxicity)

I think this article is about recycling water from sewage which involves using different technology not available 100 years ago. The bacteria’s found in sewage are just more harmful.

About recycling generally, unfortunately time to time there is talk about recycling from politicians but UK is far from Germany which for more than 20 years has a more effective compulsory recycling system in place. Honestly I don’t know how many more years are needed to start proper recycling in UK.

For reference, around 70% of the planet is water, however only 2% is Fresh Water and 1.6% is locked up in the Poles and Glaciers.. this is why there is a concern about the Poles melting as this would ‘de-salinate’ the oceans likely to cause changes in ocean temperatures, currents and weather patterns.

I am not some ‘Green’ Warrior, but common sense states we need to use water MORE efficiently, stop usinig fresh water in Boilers, Toilets, Washing Machines etc and to recycle as much as we can….