The past 18 months has seen a mad lot of home renovation work at This Old Farmhouse. It culminated this week with the installation of a lovely pair of dual-flush low-flow toilets. Not so exciting to many, perhaps, but then we don’t get out much… In fact, He Who Hogs The Power Tools just sent out the following “news release” to family and friends, trumpeting our green plumbing triumph. Enjoy! ~Jen

Upgrade to “Dual Exhaust” System

No, it’s not what you might be thinking — we’ve just completed the changeover to more environmentally responsible dual flush toilets in our two bathrooms — which is the last item on our list of upgrades for the government-sponsored Home Energy Retrofit program.

No, it doesn’t increase performance in a ’68 Mustang kinda way (although as you can see in the pictures below, we’ve temporarily got “four-on-the-floor”!) but by replacing two thirsty 20-litre-per-flush toilets (driven by two coffee drinkers), we’ll significantly reduce our water consumption — and cut back on the electricity that’s used to pump that water, too.

The dual flush comes down to the basics we all learned as kids — #1 or #2. 4 Litres / 6 litres. Nuff said.

In the past 18 months we’ve made significant improvements to reduce our heating and energy costs, as well as adding a couple of quality-of-life items like a new veranda and fencing in the side yard so the dogs can be “relieved on their own recognizance.”

In return, the Feds will reimburse us about 3% of what we’ve spent (think Canadian Tire Money on the value of a slightly-used Lincoln Navigator). It’s not a lot, but along with the reduced fuel bills and the “feel good” factor — it’s well worth it.

You may know by now that I’m a big SIGG fan on a daily basis, but I have to confess that I am not without sin.

The hard truth is, in the real world, every so often you just end up having to buy some beverage that comes in a plastic bottle. (Big family-sized pop bottles for a birthday party, for example, or a bottle of water when you’re stuck in an airport queue for hours on end.)

And the beverage bottle issue comes up again, just now, with yet another news story about the growing waste problem caused by the North American passion for bottled water. Some municipalities are talking of a ban on bottled water, it’s that big an issue! (But what about other bottled beverages, I do wonder…?)

I don’t get many of these bottles, true, but it’s good to try to reuse the ones that do come into my hands.

Okay, then —

• Refill the empties with other beverages?

• Freeze water in them to act as a cold-pack in a picnic basket?

But then, what?

Bird feeding station

I’ve got a little gadget that converts a 2-litre bottle to a bird feeder, and that’s better than nothing — although it’s very far from being squirrel-proof, and it tends to spray birdseed around if caught in a good brisk wind.

Slow-release watering system

A more practical gadget is a spike with holes in it that screws onto the top of a soft drink bottle filled with water. You poke it into the garden or planter, and it’ll release the water down at the plant’s root zone, to keep everything green and happy when you abandon your garden for a few days away. (My mother has a half-dozen of those, for her big pots of geraniums on the sunny deck. The plants are big and bushy enough to hide a 750ml or 1-litre bottle, just fine.)

Instant watering can

Now here’s another interesting bottle conversion: Twist & Spout comes in two versions, for kitchen and garden (the difference is in the size of the spout.)

In the kitchen, the twist-on handle and spout makes a big fat beverage bottle a bit easier to handle and pour, especially for little people with small hands. In the garden (or among the house plants, for that matter) the attachment turns an old bottle into an instant watering can.

Twist & Spout fits “virtually any soda or water bottle with a screw-on cap” and goes for $5.99 at Perpetual Kid.

I’m in two minds about this kind of product, to be honest —

Should we buy another piece of plastic just to make it easier to reuse the first one? But if it kept you from buying a plastic watering can, would that balance out the plastic-consumption equation? Oh, but hey! Is the Twist & Spout made of recycled post-consumer plastic, by any chance? They don’t say on the sales page… but if it was, that would make a difference, wouldn’t it?

Sheesh.
As the frog said, “It’s not easy being green.”

[via The Green Head, who also prefers a stylish reusable aluminum bottle.]