In Pittsburgh PA, we are keenly aware of the steep costs of utilities, and as a result many people spend the winters carefully monitoring their heat usage and the summers trying not to have the air conditioner on too much.
Yet we rarely consider one of the easiest, most effective, and most painless ways to slash our home utility bills – regulating our home water pressure.
What is High Water Pressure?
High water pressure is exactly what it sounds like – a situation where the water pressure coming into your house from your municipality is far higher than what you actually need. Every time you turn on a faucet, take a shower, do the dishes, wash your clothes, or flush a toilet you end up using far more water than is required for the task.
From a numbers standpoint, high water pressure is anything above 60 psi (pounds per square inch). The typical home should have a water pressure of around 50 psi. Some homes have water pressure as high as 300 psi.
From a monetary standpoint, high water pressure leads to artificially high water bills, damaged plumbing, and broken-down appliances.
Consider this: If you run a kitchen faucet for 10 minutes with the ideal water pressure of 50 psi , you’ll use about 30 gallons of water.
If your pressure is at 80 psi, you’ll use 40 gallons, 10 of which is essentially wasted.
If your pressure is at 150 psi, which is not at all uncommon, you’ll go through 56 gallons of water, 26 of which is wasted.
Multiply those 10-26 wasted gallons by the number of times each day that somebody uses your home’s water, then multiply that by the number of days in a month, and you’ll see that you might be paying for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of gallons each month that you don’t need.
And not only are you paying to use water that you don’t need, but you’re also paying to heat that water for showers, dishes, laundry, and more.
How Do I Know If I Have High Water Pressure?
One obvious sign is “water hammer” – that pounding noise you might sometimes hear in your pipes. Other indications are leaky faucets, a leaky water heater, and problems with your dishwasher and/or clothes washing machine – or anything that uses water automatically.
But high water pressure often begins without symptoms, so it’s important to have it checked.
Keep in mind that water pressure fluctuates throughout the day. It will likely be higher at night, when less people are using water, but appear to be quite low during the day, when more people in your neighborhood are showering, washing clothes, etc.
Gillece Services, a Plumbing, Heating, Cooling and Electrical company located in Pittsburgh PA, will perform a free water pressure inspection using our professional-grade equipment that can get a precise read of you water pressure and test your water heating system for thermal expansion. If your home has an issue, we can usually have it fixed the same day.
Typically, we will install a water pressure reducing valve – a mechanical device that automatically regulates the water throughout your home. Installed near your water meter, it will keep the pressure in your home at an acceptable level, regardless of how high the pressure is in the pipe that connects to your municipal water system.
(The actual mechanics of how a reducing valve works are fairly complicated, but here’s an explanation from the Physics Forums).
How Much Money Can I Save?
That depends on a variety of factors, including your current water pressure, your municipal water rates, and your personal water usage.
Water pressure reducing valves often pay for themselves in just a year or two. If your pressure is currently at 100 psi and you reduce it to a more appropriate 50 psi, you will be using one-third less water than you otherwise would have. You will also be heating less water for showers, laundry, and dishes. The more people in a household, the bigger the savings.
