3 ms·

You lean/step out of the water to apply stuff and then lean/step back in. Are your showers the size of coffins or something? I get the efficiency of Navy Show

You lean/step out of the water to apply stuff and then lean/step back in. Are your showers the size of coffins or something? I get the efficiency of Navy Showers, but water is cheap where I'm at. Would be a lot of extra effort and discomfort for negligible savings. Maybe it makes sense if you live in a desert or, as the name implies, you're on a ship

stavros 4y ago
> Are your showers the size of coffins or something? No, we just don't like wasting water/heating. I don't know how much extra effort it is to turn the tap off when you're done with it. It definitely doesn't feel like effort to me, and having the water run while I'm trying to avoid it so I can soap myself up is very annoying. > water is cheap where I'm at. You are in a thread where people are installing heat pumps to reclaim the wasted heat. Is saying "how about you don't waste the heat in the first place" really that crazy?
- scottLobster 4y ago
  If it's a micro-optimization that produces no real value, then perhaps it isn't crazy, but is irrational if the goal is to save meaningful amounts of money. You can also compress/save used aluminum cans and periodically sell them to a scrap metal dealership for money. Quick check shows scrap aluminum cans are selling for a national average of $0.45/lb, and it takes about 32-35 12 oz cans to accrue 1 lb of aluminum cans. Assuming you go through a 24 pack of cans per week, enjoy your ~$1.30/month savings for hours of effort!
  - stavros 4y ago
    Yeah, well, to the millions of people for whom that's just "how one showers", your way seems needlessly wasteful, like heaping food on your plate only to throw most of it away. At least food is cheap, I guess!
  - TeMPOraL 4y ago
    I remember the push for showers over bathtubs to be based on the argument that they're X% more water-efficient. I would imagine this refers to "Navy"[0] style, as not turning off the shower for the entire duration will easily waste a few bathtubs' worth of water. How cheap is water in your place you'd consider this a micro-optimization? In my country, unless you're tech-salary-equivalent-or-above, not doing it - and doubling or tripling your hot water (or water + gas) bill - would noticeably cut into whatever discretionary spending money you have. Micro-optimization would be "grey water reclamation" with a bucket placed in a sink, to reuse hand-washing water for flushing the toilet. Which is something my wife and I started to do a while ago, and while we don't need to do it, the drop in utility bills for near-zero effort is impressive enough that we continue anyway. ---- [0] - Or should I say "Standard Showers", as I literally can't think of anyone who doesn't turn off the water for soaping after being made aware that water and heating both cost money.
    - scottLobster 4y ago
      I'm in Philadelphia, PA, USA. It's a convoluted formula based on your type of sewer hookup (https://water.phila.gov/pool/files/rates-and-charges-2022-09-01.pdf https://water.phila.gov/pool/files/rates-and-charges-2022-09...) and there are different tiers of usage, but the initial base rate is $48.96 for the first 1,000 cubic feet of water or 7,480 gallons, so about $0.0065/gallon + sewer cost. A "typical" household in the city (they estimate 500 cubic feet of water usage) is apparently around $70/month total. We typically come in under that at around $60. My gas bill runs about the same in non-winter months, but most of that is the clothes dryer and oven/range. So it's not a negligible amount of money, but it costs less than my combined streaming services. Cutting it by 20% would allow me to afford... another streaming service? A couple of days' groceries? I'm also not sure what kind of showers you're taking, but I know from experience being forced to shower with a mostly-clogged drain for a couple of days there's no way my shower head is filling the tub even over my ankles before the shower is done (5-10 minutes). So "several bath tubs" is an exaggeration unless you're taking extremely long showers or your showerhead has the efficiency of a fire hydrant. And I guess we're just blessed with plentiful water on the US East Coast, because I've lived in several states on this coast for my entire life and I'd never even heard of "Navy Shower" until college, and only then as a reference to... the Navy! Or sometimes we hear about Californians being asked to do so when a drought hits. But whatever, you do you! If it actually does make a difference for you than go for it!
  - throwaway22032 4y ago
    Turning the tap on and off in my shower is zero effort, though? It literally takes 0 seconds. I used to have a shower that didn't have a thermostat so it was fiddly to get the temperature right. That one I'd lean in and out, sure.

stavros 4y ago

> Are your showers the size of coffins or something? No, we just don't like wasting water/heating. I don't know how much extra effort it is to turn the tap off when you're done with it. It definitely doesn't feel like effort to me, and having the water run while I'm trying to avoid it so I can soap myself up is very annoying. > water is cheap where I'm at. You are in a thread where people are installing heat pumps to reclaim the wasted heat. Is saying "how about you don't waste the heat in the first place" really that crazy?

scottLobster 4y ago
If it's a micro-optimization that produces no real value, then perhaps it isn't crazy, but is irrational if the goal is to save meaningful amounts of money. You can also compress/save used aluminum cans and periodically sell them to a scrap metal dealership for money. Quick check shows scrap aluminum cans are selling for a national average of $0.45/lb, and it takes about 32-35 12 oz cans to accrue 1 lb of aluminum cans. Assuming you go through a 24 pack of cans per week, enjoy your ~$1.30/month savings for hours of effort!
- stavros 4y ago
  Yeah, well, to the millions of people for whom that's just "how one showers", your way seems needlessly wasteful, like heaping food on your plate only to throw most of it away. At least food is cheap, I guess!
- TeMPOraL 4y ago
  I remember the push for showers over bathtubs to be based on the argument that they're X% more water-efficient. I would imagine this refers to "Navy"[0] style, as not turning off the shower for the entire duration will easily waste a few bathtubs' worth of water. How cheap is water in your place you'd consider this a micro-optimization? In my country, unless you're tech-salary-equivalent-or-above, not doing it - and doubling or tripling your hot water (or water + gas) bill - would noticeably cut into whatever discretionary spending money you have. Micro-optimization would be "grey water reclamation" with a bucket placed in a sink, to reuse hand-washing water for flushing the toilet. Which is something my wife and I started to do a while ago, and while we don't need to do it, the drop in utility bills for near-zero effort is impressive enough that we continue anyway. ---- [0] - Or should I say "Standard Showers", as I literally can't think of anyone who doesn't turn off the water for soaping after being made aware that water and heating both cost money.
  - scottLobster 4y ago
    I'm in Philadelphia, PA, USA. It's a convoluted formula based on your type of sewer hookup (https://water.phila.gov/pool/files/rates-and-charges-2022-09-01.pdf https://water.phila.gov/pool/files/rates-and-charges-2022-09...) and there are different tiers of usage, but the initial base rate is $48.96 for the first 1,000 cubic feet of water or 7,480 gallons, so about $0.0065/gallon + sewer cost. A "typical" household in the city (they estimate 500 cubic feet of water usage) is apparently around $70/month total. We typically come in under that at around $60. My gas bill runs about the same in non-winter months, but most of that is the clothes dryer and oven/range. So it's not a negligible amount of money, but it costs less than my combined streaming services. Cutting it by 20% would allow me to afford... another streaming service? A couple of days' groceries? I'm also not sure what kind of showers you're taking, but I know from experience being forced to shower with a mostly-clogged drain for a couple of days there's no way my shower head is filling the tub even over my ankles before the shower is done (5-10 minutes). So "several bath tubs" is an exaggeration unless you're taking extremely long showers or your showerhead has the efficiency of a fire hydrant. And I guess we're just blessed with plentiful water on the US East Coast, because I've lived in several states on this coast for my entire life and I'd never even heard of "Navy Shower" until college, and only then as a reference to... the Navy! Or sometimes we hear about Californians being asked to do so when a drought hits. But whatever, you do you! If it actually does make a difference for you than go for it!
- throwaway22032 4y ago
  Turning the tap on and off in my shower is zero effort, though? It literally takes 0 seconds. I used to have a shower that didn't have a thermostat so it was fiddly to get the temperature right. That one I'd lean in and out, sure.