The Nearly Guilt-Free Hot Shower, Provided by EcoDrain
Sustainability & Technology
"The Nearly Guilt-Free Hot Shower, Provided by EcoDrain"
By J. Matthew Roney via Sustainablog
Do you enjoy a good hot shower? Who doesn’t, right? But any good
greenie knows that you’re also using up precious resources: not just
water, but also energy. Water heating’s a pretty energy-intensive
proposition, as water itself can absorb an awful lot of heat… so it
takes lots of energy (relatively) to get it to the temperature necessary
for that steamy shower. And that’s all you get for that energy: once
that water heads down the drain, the heat and energy goes with it. That
hot shower doesn’t just feel luxurious… it is!
What if you could recapture and reuse some of that heat energy? The technology’s actually existed to do this for some time, but mostly at large scales. There are options for your shower water, but they’ve traditionally been expensive and fairly inefficient.
The EcoDrain
(which one of my PR buds pointed out to me) claims to overcome the
hurdles traditionally associated with in-home heat recovery, allowing
the homeowner to earn back some of the cost of the unit. Here’s the
company’s video explanation of how the EcoDrain works:
Interesting, huh? Because colleague Derek Markham already covered the EcoDrain over at Treehugger,
I’ve also gotten a sense of the objections people might raise… such as
“wouldn’t it get clogged up with hair and such?” The engineer who
created the heat exchanger, David Velan, claims “The
drain water flows over a flat plate and then out a streamlined end cap.
There is nothing inside the device that will trap hair,” and that no
issues have arisen in over a year with installed EcoDrains. Some are
also quibbling about the rate of payback expected from the device, but
that’s math… I’ll let others answer that.
The company also claims ease of installation as a benefit – if you’re
a plumber, or someone who’s got the chops to work on his/her own
plumbing, let us know what you think – would you have a fairly easy time
installing the EcoDrain?
"The Nearly Guilt-Free Hot Shower, Provided by EcoDrain"
By J. Matthew Roney via Sustainablog
What if you could recapture and reuse some of that heat energy? The technology’s actually existed to do this for some time, but mostly at large scales. There are options for your shower water, but they’ve traditionally been expensive and fairly inefficient.
The EcoDrain
(which one of my PR buds pointed out to me) claims to overcome the
hurdles traditionally associated with in-home heat recovery, allowing
the homeowner to earn back some of the cost of the unit. Here’s the
company’s video explanation of how the EcoDrain works:
Interesting, huh? Because colleague Derek Markham already covered the EcoDrain over at Treehugger,
I’ve also gotten a sense of the objections people might raise… such as
“wouldn’t it get clogged up with hair and such?” The engineer who
created the heat exchanger, David Velan, claims “The
drain water flows over a flat plate and then out a streamlined end cap.
There is nothing inside the device that will trap hair,” and that no
issues have arisen in over a year with installed EcoDrains. Some are
also quibbling about the rate of payback expected from the device, but
that’s math… I’ll let others answer that.
The company also claims ease of installation as a benefit – if you’re
a plumber, or someone who’s got the chops to work on his/her own
plumbing, let us know what you think – would you have a fairly easy time
installing the EcoDrain?
Except where otherwise 
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