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Grey water eyed for efficiency

Province mulls allowing reuse of home supply

By: Bruce Owen

Posted: 10/16/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

TREVOR HAGAN / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Enlarge Image

Mike Moore of the Manitoba Home Builders Association says the new rules won't increase costs significantly.

New windows. Check.

High-efficiency furnace. Check.

Tragedy brought change

More than three years ago, city firefighters Harold Lessard and Tom Nichols were killed in a house fire in St. Boniface. Three other firefighters were injured.

One reason the fire spread from the home's garage as quickly as it did was because of the way new homes had been built up until that time.

In the years since Nichols and Lessard's deaths, the province has changed its building code to mandate the construction of a fire-resistant wall between an attached garage and a house. New homes also must have a garage heat detector that's connected to the home's smoke alarm.

More changes could be on the way, Manitoba Fire Commissioner Christopher Jones said Friday.

Jones said officials are currently looking at new-home residential ceiling sprinkler systems and how floors should be built to slow the spread of fire from one storey to the next.

He said a Natural Resources Canada study looking at different floor assemblies found some engineered systems fail faster than conventional lumber floor systems in a house fire.

Jones said the intent is to better protect occupants and firefighters.

Attic insulation. Check

Last night's bathtub water in the toilet. Huh?

Yup, the province is on the cusp of updating the building code to include grey water collection systems that use bathtub and shower water in toilet systems instead of freshwater as clean as your drinking water.

"We do think it's a pretty innovative way to reduce water consumption, to be easier on our municipal water infrastructure," Labour Minister Jennifer Howard said Friday in outlining changes to Manitoba's new building and plumbing codes.

"Right now we flush our toilets with drinkable water. The same water that comes out of your tap to drink is the water we flush down the toilet. Lots of countries in the world have a different view of that. They have the ability to use, you do your dishes, you use that water to flush the toilet."

Howard said the province will approve in-home grey water collection systems if they meet Canadian Standards Association requirements, which are expected to be released in December.

"We want to do it in a way that's safe," Howard said. "Sometimes pets drink out of the toilet and sometimes little kids find their way in there, and so we want to make sure that nobody is going to get hurt."

One person who doesn't need any convincing grey water is the way to go is new homeowner Jeff Norman--because HGTV's DYI Distaster host Bryan Baeumler recommends it.

Norman said he's installing a Quebec-made, 60-gallon tank in his new home to collect only shower and bath water.

"That tank will chlorinate the water and then that water will be redistributed to our toilets, so our toilets are not flushing clean water. Our toilets are flushing water that's already been used."

Norman said the system will cost him $3,000 to install, but based on the water consumption between him, his wife and two sons, that expense will be paid back in four to five years through water-bill savings.

Howard said when the new codes are fully implemented, Manitoba will be one of the most energy-efficient jurisdictions in North America.

Other code changes include:

-- specifying minimum energy-efficiency requirements for windows;

-- eliminating the pilot light in gas fireplace;

-- increasing the required level of attic insulation to R50;

-- requiring a minimum 94 per cent fuel-efficiency rating for furnaces,

-- specifying a mid-efficient heat-recovery ventilator;

-- introducing energy-modelling software that will allow builders to model alternatives to the code requirements.

Changes to the plumbing code allow for reduced maximum-flow rates in residential toilets and shower heads.

Howard also said the changes to the building code applies to new-home construction and major renovations of existing homes.

"You can't really make something retroactive and have everyone tear out their windows at once," she said.

Manitoba Home Builders Association president Mike Moore said the changes won't significantly increase the cost of new home construction.

"The big issue for us is always affordability," he said. "You can't put in legislation that would make it impossible to buy a new home."

bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 16, 2010 A1

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