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An Anonymous Coward writes in with this story from the Press Examiner:
In the state's latest drought-conservation measure, California regulators Wednesday adopted stricter low-flow standards for showerheads in a move designed to save billions of gallons of water annually.
Standards adopted today require that all showerheads sold not exceed 2.0 gallons per minute maximum flow rate as of July 2016.
The commission predicts that the new standards will save more than 2.4 billion gallons of water in the first year and 38 billion gallons after full stock turnover in 10 years. The California Energy Commission voted Wednesday to phase in shower-head efficiency standards, limiting them to just 1.8 gallons a minute after July 2018.
In related news, the San Diego Metropolitan Water District is thanking San Diegans for saving so much water during the shortage that they will need to raise water rates:
San Diego water customers could see their bills climb about 17 percent in the next year under a proposal that would raise rates.
A proposal that city utility officials presented Monday to the Independent Rates Oversight Committee called for overall rate increases of 9.8 percent on Jan. 1, 2016, and another 6.9 percent on July 1, 2016. The increases will cover costs including the increasing price of imported water, and lower sales expected as customers slash water use 16 percent.
Original Submission
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 17 2015, @09:24AM
While I usually take quite a while in the shower, most of the time the water is not running. It's only on in the beginning to make me wet, and in the end to get the soap from the body. In between I'm only making the soap wet a few times.
If you let the water run the whole time I'm in the shower, I'm sure you'd get several baths full. But that's not what I do.
And I certainly would not have the time for four showers a day. ;-)
BTW, what do you mean with "he isolated the shower after that"?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday August 17 2015, @11:35AM
most of the time the water is not running
I can't help my engineering background and try to make it a continuous flow process, so shampoo/soap up top down, water flowing downhill and all that means my hair and head are pretty well rinsed off before my legs get soap so like 15 seconds after I finish soap, I'm totally done. Combined soap and rinse process flow seems to take much less time than separate soap and rinse. Sometimes gravity is helpful.
I fooled around with some experiments and some low flow showers and IF you're solely focused on getting clean, it takes roughly X gallons where you can high flow that in like 3 minutes or ultra low flow that over 15 minutes its the same number of gallons in the end. Also my unintended experiments with drain clogs indicate its difficult to take a shower long enough to fill the tub enough for a bath.
Now what the OP is talking about is something totally different than mere cleaning, an unclothed teenage girl's private adventure of discovery of her body, etc, some women take like an hour but they're really enjoying their "shower" time so just let them be and pay the water bill, I guess. Also if they shave in there I'd give them a free pass, as an engineering estimate multiply the ratio of my face to their body times how long it takes to shave my face and its gonna be awhile, I can see the appeal of waxing or alternative hair removal technologies when you've got so much surface area. I admit when I've gotten a sunburn that a nice cold shower feels good so I could stand there for awhile. Also sleepy/sick need to wake up, its possible to just stand there as the water splashes you as you drift out of sleep. So a low flow shower head for non-cleaning purposes could be appropriate. Ideally they'd have a valve, turn the valve this way to get clean, turn it the other way to grow the hair on your palms or whatever. "Suddenly, my teen is spending an hour a day in the shower" "Uh yeah... TMI".
WRT the op claim about 4 showers a day, maybe I'm watching the wrong american movies. When I take two, in the morning and after exercise, I start having dry skin issues especially in the winter. I'll shuffle my schedule in the winter to cut down to one shower per day to prevent skin drying.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 17 2015, @12:11PM
Who the hell takes four showers a day? Or even three, on a regular basis?
And what kind of showers is the OP taking that it uses more water than filling up the bath?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 17 2015, @01:34PM
Unless you have one of those rich-people showers with 6 heads in it how the hell can you come anywhere close to a tub's worth of water? My two showerheads are not quite low-flow since I drilled out the restrictors but even if I plugged the drain it'd take an hour to get the tub anywhere near full.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Nuke on Monday August 17 2015, @12:09PM
BTW, what do you mean with "he isolated the shower after that"?
He took the electrical fuse out of it so it would not work.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 17 2015, @02:03PM
Electrical fuse? What sort of shower is that? The showers I know need water, and nothing else.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday August 17 2015, @05:42PM
If you had teenagers, you would know about the devices which mix in electricity in the shower head. Voltage goes up over time. Helps them be done faster, regardless of what they are doing.
"Isolating the shower" reduces the amount of electricity lost down the drain, for max teenager motivation.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 17 2015, @02:07PM
He took the electrical fuse out of it so it would not work.
In UK and other places outside the USA, it's common to see an electric water heater (flash heater) located in the shower -- I guess a retrofit for bath tubs that didn't originally have a shower? Means installing only one pipe up the wall. Also, since hot water systems are often based on a separate, gravity flow tank, this avoids any problems from mixing hot and cold (mains) water that are at different pressures.
My experience with these electric showers (coming from USA) is that the flow is tiny and the temperature regulation awful... And then there is the potential shock risk--one engineer in UK said that the 220V mains wiring is just on the other side of the electric heating unit (no double isolation) -- maybe someone from UK can expand on this?
In USA (speaking to anyone who has not investigated N. American plumbing) we typically have a large hot water heater with integrated storage tank located in a basement or utility closet. There are other options too, but they are all operated at mains pressure. Then hot and cold pressurized water (mains water pressure) are available throughout the house. Shower (and sink) valves allow the user to mix hot and cold.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday August 17 2015, @12:31PM
"BTW, what do you mean with "he isolated the shower after that"?"
Speaking as a maintenance man, who often "isolates" electrical circuits, I would say that he opened an access panel, and turned the water to the shower off. No more juveniles wasting six tubs of hot water down the shower drain!