Install a greywater system

By Michael Pon, Landscape Architect

To ‘reuse’ your water, consider installing a greywater system in your home! A basic laundry-to-landscape (L2L) system lets you recycle water from your clothes washer to your garden. Instead of sending laundry water down the sewer, your greywater (H2O + soap) is used a second time to water plants in your yard. Win-win!

Installing a greywater system is easy: you can get the parts from a local irrigation or landscaping supply store. Add a 3-way valve to divert greywater from your washer to your re-use zone (when bleach is required for your laundry, flip the valve to send that waste water to your sewer). Then dig a small 4” trench to the mulch basins of plants you wish to irrigate with greywater, and connect them to your 3-way valve with PVC pipes (as shown in the photos above and below).

Learn more about greywater systems from the Urban Farmer Store and Greywater Action. If you have questions about installing a L2L system like ours, email me at Michael Pon Consulting. If you live in Marin, you can get a $100 discount on your purchase of a greywater system from Marin Water. 

For more water-saving tips and resources, read Save Water, our Green Change action guide.

Photos by Michael Pon (see more photos of his greywater system)