Although the rain is falling today and the reservoir appears full - in these times of water shortages, drought and hosepipe bans, we all need to do our bit to conserve water. Last year’s watering ban by Aquarion Water in Fairfield County – although essential was almost disastrous for one of my clients in New Canaan. Despite the total ban now being lifted, watering in the town is still restricted to twice a week.
Irrigation systems are a convenient and often necessary component to keep your landscaping alive and thriving, but did you know that nationally,18 billion gallons of water are wasted by sprinkler systems each year? That is enough to fill the Great Salt Lake in Utah. Twice over.
Sprinkler controllers that are programmed to run at set times, on set days are the worst culprits. Watering whilst it is raining, makes no sense. Sure, you can install a rain sensor, but these are primitive technology which has been pretty much the same for the last 30 years. A small capsule has a sponge in it – when enough rain is captured and the sponge expands, it triggers the rain sensor. It can take days for the sponge to dry out and contract, before the sensor is deactivated. A rain sensor is also not clever enough to know how much rain has fallen. It also doesn’t know that rain is forecast, so your sprinkler system can run at 11pm for two hours, then it could start raining at 2.00am for the next five hours, meaning you wasted all that water for no reason.
For the aforementioned client we recently installed a Rachio Smart Sprinkler Controller (Generation 2). This is a Wi-Fi connected sprinkler controller system that can be controlled from your smartphone. Once the controller is installed you download the app onto your phone, and you are ready to setup, monitor, control and adjust your sprinkler system from anywhere in the world at any time. No more running to your garage, or the backyard wall-mounted controller to turn dials and cycle through confusing menus.
During setup, you follow a few simple steps to add details such as plant, and soil types, how much sun each zone gets, and the slope of the zone for calculating run-off amounts. Rachio will then calculate the optimal amount of water for every zone, and set up a schedule to that will save you literally thousands of gallons of water every month, whilst keeping your landscaping looking at its beautiful, healthiest best.
But that is not all. You can also set your controller so that it will not water before, during or after rain. Rachio uses the internet to connect to hundreds of local weather stations, and automatically adjusts or skips watering schedules as and when needed.
May was a particularly rainy month.This is where the Rachio came into its own. It actually saved my client more water than it used! From just four rain delays in May, it saved 3,668 gallons of water, whereas for the whole month, it only used 2, 239. This device is not cheap to buy, but it will usually pay for itself in 12-18 months through savings to your water bill. It provides detailed reports on your usage, so you see the savings rack up on a weekly basis. The app is simple - a joy to use, with photos of each zone, and an intuitive interface. If you go to work on a Monday after planting new plants on the weekend, and have forgotten to water them – no problem! Take out your phone and set that zone to run for 15 minutes. If you an Amazon Alexa user, you can even set your sprinklers to run through a voice command when you are at home.
The smart home revolution is only just getting started, and there are a lot of smart home devices out there that are still not much more than a gimmick. The Rachio Smart Sprinkler Controller is an exception. A truly useful device that is not only a joy to use, it will save you money and help to protect our most precious of resources. Water.
Many States and water companies are offering rebates on controllers such as the Rachio. But not in Connecticut. If Aquarion and the State are serious about wanting to conserve water, we should urge them to copy California and others, and encourage people to install these amazing controllers, by way of a $100 rebate. If enough people installed them, we could literally save millions of gallons of unnecessary watering every season. Now THAT really would be smart.
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Submitted by New Canaan, CT
