Start the Year Off by Fixing Annoying Plumbing Leaks

A new year means a fresh start. As plumbing company that visits thousands of American homes each day, we’re amazed by the number of leaks there are in a typical household. We’re talking about water leaks that people have simply learned to live with. Too many homeowners just ignore dripping faucets, showers and tubs if they can’t fix the leaks themselves. We’ve seen tub spouts
that are beyond dripping, they’re actually pouring a steady stream of water right down the drain. Sure, it’s a trickle most of the time, but that water ads up quickly and is costing the homeowner a lot of money in water and sewer bills. This helpful infographic demonstrates how leaks add up.

Consider a faucet that drips 30 drops per minute, which is quite common. That faucet is wasting ten liters per day. That’s like five of those large 2 liter soft drink bottles. Over the course of a year, that faucet is wasting 1,041 gallons of water! To see how much water your leak is wasting, simply count the drips for one minute then visit the USGS Drip Calculator on-line and enter the information. It even allows you to add multiple leaking faucets into the calculation and determine how much water all of the plumbing leaks in your house are wasting.

Toilet leaks are common too. If your toilet is “running,” it is leaking. A leaking toilet is a huge waste of water, sometimes accounting for hundreds of gallons per week! Many toilets have silent leaks. To test your toilet for leaks, there are two easy methods. First, drop a few drops of red food coloring in the tank. Wait fifteen minutes then look in the toilet bowl. If the water in the bowl has turned red, you have a leak. Another easy way to test is to open the tank, drop a pinch of flour or baby powder into the tank. Watch it closely and see if it begins to drift toward the overflow tube and disappears. If so, you have a silent leak that is wasting water and costing you money. Why not hire a plumber to fix those leaks once and for all? You’ll be doing yourself a favor in the long run and you’ll be doing something helpful for your community, your country and even the planet. Fresh water is a precious resource that we should not take for granted.