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It used to be illegal to do anything except direct the rainwater, e.g. direct a downspout into your flower garden. You are now allowed 2 55-gallon rain barrels.
by sliverstorm 9y ago
It used to be illegal to do anything except direct the rainwater, e.g. direct a downspout into your flower garden. You are now allowed 2 55-gallon rain barrels.
The bummer is, even though you can now have rain barrels, it rains infrequently enough in Colorado that it's not terribly economical to buy 55-gallon rain barrels.
At $2.77 per 1,000 gallons from the utility, with infrequent rainfall it's pretty hard to ever recoup $176 for a 110 gallon system from BlueBarrelSystems. You're looking at 580 rains required to break even- while Denver, for example, sees only 40 days with "any measurable rainfall" a year.
- fludlight 9y agoThat might be the cost of the water today, but history suggests that the price of water can fluctuate wildly. This is doubly true of the marginal cost beyond a certain baseline, which, again, fluctuates. Even without a drought or increase in regional population, you are vulnerable to (utility price, not CPI) inflation after ~5 years. The math for computing a break even period thus becomes squishy. There are many people that place great value on being partially-off-the-grid, on (conspicuous) conservation, and enjoy DIY projects.
- sliverstorm 9y agoAll good points, and certainly if you went entirely off-grid, avoiding a water tap fee is big savings. Though, 110 gallons isn't going to get you very far if you're totally off-grid.