Coolest Shade of Green Toilets

You might wonder what is the ‘Coolest Shade of Green’ for toilets going into a LEED® Platinum certified building. Maybe you have had an experience similar to mine, when I was designing a bathroom for a client a decade ago, who proclaimed loudly that he must have a “big flush” toilet. He claimed the newer lower-flush toilets just didn’t perform well and he was not impressed with having to flush twice. We have come a long way in toilet-technology in the last 10 years and even more since Thomas Crapper applied for patents to improve water closets in mid 19^th century Britain.

Recently, I attended a seminar about the certification of Chapelview in Brampton, Canada. Martinway Contracting Ltd. is attempting 54 points, slating this to likely become the first LEED® Platinum certified affordable housing project in the world. Green toilets are one of the products they considered to achieve this remarkable goal.

Steve Kemp of Enermodal Engineering and the senior LEED® consultant on the Chapelview project explained that 2/3 of water used in a home is flushed potable water. That means that our good drinking water is being wasted, especially with the older 12-litre flush toilets!

Martinway Contracting Partner, John D’Angelo selected for this project, the Proficiency_toilet, which is the first 3-litre toilet for both liquid and solid flushes. It uses an air transfer system to create an aggressive flush that really works the first time and is less noisy than pressurized flush systems. Pressure is maintained in the trapway, instead of the tank. It was designed by Phil Hennessy of Hennessy & Hinchcliffe Inc. of Mississauga Canada, and is available through all major wholesalers and can be ordered through retailers such as Home Hardware. Use of this toilet is a major component for the Chapelview project set to achieve an astonishing 46% water reduction over what would normally be expected.

Other toilets that also have significant advantages in water savings include the Niagara_Flapperless range of toilets, with 6.0 and 4.8 litre sizes. Noted for its flapperless tip-bucket design, it is innovative, simple, and leak proof. Conventional toilets can leak at the base of the tank when the flapper does not align properly or sit tightly. A bucket holds the water in a flapperless toilet tank, preventing cold water from shocking the porcelain with every flush, creating an advantage for longeveity of the tank and lack of condensation during the summer.

Choosing a low-flow toilet that performs efficiently can save a homeowner hundreds of dollars per year according to Hennessy, and this will become even more critical as the price of our precious natural resource is bound to increase.  It can also save our municipalities (and therefore our taxes), millions of dollars in reduced costs to pump, distribute and treat water and wastewater.

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