My hometown is really behind the times in more ways than one. Bear in mind that this is 2008, and the local council have only just decided to start handing out Save-a-Flush bags to residents – these are permeable plastic bags that contain silicone gel crystals and sit at the bottom of a cistern.

Save-a-Flush bags have been around for a while now, and were introduced to help households with toilets that had cisterns installed between 1993-1999 (usually with a storage capacity of 7-9 litres). They work by displacing water from the cistern which would otherwise be wasted with each flush; the crystals absorb the water from the cistern and after six hours, swell up to maximum size. A fully expanded Save-a-Flush bag – also known as a Cistern Bag or a Waterman – will apparently displace about one litre of water, which equates to about £10 a year off of your rates if you pay for your water on a meter.

Should you pay for your water on a billed basis, then the financial difference of installing such as device is negligible, as you pay a fixed amount regardless, but its worth doing all the same as its good for the environment, and by contributing less to water waste, you could potentially help avoid any future hosepipe bans (although if the last couple of summers are anything to go by, then this probably won’t matter!).

For older lavs with bigger cisterns installed before 1993, you can apply for a Hippo water saver – these are robust plastic bags that again sit at the bottom of the cistern and act as a kind of reservoir, retaining up to 3 litres of water after every flush; a tiny hole in the bottom of the bag allows for continual water circulation prevents stagnation. Both of these products are readily available from water companies such as Thames Water and will already be familiar to many UK households.

Perhaps not so familiar to some will be the Interflush – a little device manufactured by Varyflush Ltd that sits on top of the siphon in the cistern in handle-operated flush loos, and requires a bit more DIY nous to install than simply bunging a bag in the bottom. Installing an Interflush device allows you to control the flush for as long as is required, therefore if a full flush is required, you simply hold the handle down for as long as is needed; this avoids you having to double flush, which is pretty wasteful, and not to mention unpleasant!

A single Interflush device costs around £17.95 plus an additional £1.95 for postage and packaging. However if you order two or more Interflush kits, then the P&P charge is waived, saving you just under £4 if you ordered a couple separately.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 1st, 2008 at 10:37 am and is filed under Money Saving Tips, Savings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.