Got a bath renovation on your mind? Believe it or not, you can make your bathroom green—or at least greener than it’s been.

Start with the easy stuff like energy conservation. Lighting control systems and occupancy sensors can help you save on electricity. Even installing an inexpensive dimmer switch can allow you to keep a very dim light on at night, and this uses far less electricity. Occupancy sensors like Wattstopper/Legrand’s Vacancy Sensors and Lightolier’s IntelliSight can be installed fairly easily as well. These will automatically shut off the lights in a specified time after someone leaves the bath. Lighting control systems can dim lights and shut them off automatically, though these are more expensive and usually a part of a house-wide project. 

For water conservation, install low-flush toilets that use only 1.6 gallons per flush. Dual-flush toilets are even better, because they flush even less water for liquid waste. You can get low-flow faucets and showerheads. There are also automatic faucets like the EcoPower from Toto in our very green Home of the Year—you wave your hand under them to start the flow, and the flow of the water recharges it. Pretty cool. (Or warm, if your prefer.)

There are even systems that replace the water that goes cold in the hot water pipes with warm water when a person enters the bathroom. A motion sensor in our Green Silver Home of the Year winner detects when someone enters the bathroom. Then the cool water is flushed out of the warm-water pipe and reused elsewhere, and hot water is fed to the faucet by the time a person needs it. This is done using a Grundfos water recirculating pump. (Everyone who has a bathroom a long way from a hot water tank or boiler knows how long it can take to get hot water to the tap.)

And how can you have a bath full of hot water without burning oil or gas? Check out a solar thermal system. Many solar thermal systems use solar collectors (like solar panels) on the roof to heat a glycol liquid or water in tubing. (The glycol anti-freeze is used in northern climes and passes through a heat exchanger, in turn heating water in a tank.) It’s clean and green.

Also, think about installing a radiant heating system under a floor or bathroom tiles—and now think about how warm that can be on your toes on a cold morning. Ahhhh. Those radiant heating tubes can be warmed by a solar thermal or geothermal heating system. Geothermal uses the heat below ground, which in most areas is warm and stable. Tubes run horizontally or vertically into the ground, and with the help of a heat exchanger can provide stable heat and cooling. (Cooling occurs by storing in the ground the excess heat pulled from the house.) Geothermal systems are great to use with radiant heating systems, due to the stability of the heat.

Let us know if you have other ideas to green a bath!

Steven Castle
Senior Editor, Electronic House Magazine

Steven Castle is a writer, editor, and humorist who recently completed Filthy Rich Things, a savage satire on our thirst for success and wealth. He is presently expanding his magazine work by writing more about alternative energy sources and green building.

Steven Castle can be reached at scastle@ehpub.com