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Greywater / grey water system in Australia - asking for opinion

11/03/2007 - 12:19
shar16
Posts: 2
 Joined: 2007-11-03

Hi everyone,

I am new in this forum. I am a student at monash university in Melbourne. I am doing some research about greywater system and about its prospect in the future.

If you are interested to do this survey, please give your opinion about the greywater system. Please include your full name, job/ position or your status if you are still a student, your company or your university, and contact detail (email or any possible contact details if you don't mind) so that I could include you in my interim report as my references.

I am doing research for a company in Australia. This company has a product which is well known for their rotational molding. This company has been dealing with pits and tanks. And currently, the manager asks my team to design a greywater system including the profitability analysis. This company approaches the market through builders like you (not direct marketing to end consumers). Therefore, I will really need some advise from all of you.

As you know that the water restriction has giving us no choice but to save more drinking/ fresh water. My team is currenty designing two kinds of greywater system design. This recycled water is expected to be useable for toilet flushing and gardening.

The system is consisting a water tank which will be installed underground to make sure there is no contact with people as it is not allowed by government. Other things which are not going to be installed underground are pumps, carbon filter and UV filter. One system is good for a household of 2-4, and another is good for household of 4-6.

In current market, the greywater system available is only either class A (clear water and sterilized) or the greywater which is not sterilized and can't be store more than 24 hours. The price range for class A is 10,000 above and is good for watering the garden, fill up fish pond, toilet flushing. The price range for the other greywater is only 450 to 750 and is only good for watering the garden.

The system that my team are creating is a new class of greywater. It is a secondary advance greywater. It is not as "clear" as the class A, but it is sterilized and can be store more than 24 hours. And is good for toilet flushing and gardening. The costs of these sytems all together are 4500aud. However discount is still applicable. For every item sold, builders will also get commission.

For all of you who is currently employed under a company or are employers, please let me know if from builders point of view, this will be a competitive price to enter the market. For instance, what is your opinion about the prospective of this greywater system. As in, will builders agree to install this greywater system when they are building some properties; what kind of percentage from sales you are expecting for your commission. Any opinion other than what I suggested will be welcome.

For students, your suggestion will also be appreciated. You could give your own thoughts about whether this system could enter the market of builders, as I have mentioned above that we are targetting builders to deliver this system to the household.

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Comments

11/03/2007 - 18:58
Klapton
Klapton's picture
LHBA Member
Posts: 657
 Joined: 2007-08-16
Regulations vary widely in the US

Here in the US, regulations about handling waste water vary widely in different states, counties, and townships. In many places here, anything other than the standard septic designs they are accustomed to are most likely to be rejected.

The other thing that would affect marketability of a greywater system here is availability and cost of water. Where I will be building, in rural western Washington State, it rains so much that well water is abundant, and essentially free once you pay to have your well drilled and installed. Or if people are on municipal water supply, it's usually not very expensive.

I can see two possible reasons why someone where I plan to build would want a greywater system:

1) They get a warm fuzzy from being environmentally conscious by not wasting clean, drinking-quality water on their gardens.

2) On the rare occasion where there are drought restrictions on watering your lawn, you could still use your greywater.

Now there are more arid places in the US where something like this might be more marketable. (The desert Southwest, for example). But even there they would have to contend with government regulations regarding wastewater. Perhaps regions like that have regulations that encourage greywater systems? I honestly don't know.

I wish you good luck with your study. Oh yeah, I'm a computer programmer by occupation. I telecommute, which is what will make it possible for me to build my log cabin in the middle of nowhere.

--

http://www.LarrysLogCabin.com/
LHBA Class of October, 2007
Status: Waiting to sell current home, planning



11/04/2007 - 08:35
shar16
Posts: 2
 Joined: 2007-11-03
Thank you for your reply.

Thank you for your reply. Here in Australia, the water restriction is really high. Therefore, we are trying to push this product to the market. Australia community are very concern about environment. They always like the recycle idea.

I am doing this research with my team. But, the pressure is always on me as I am doing the marketing section.

I am actually doing accounting but taking responsibilities as marketer. Not only have to know about the marketing section, but I have to also know about the greywater product which is out of my league. And also, the installation at household, which is totally NOT ME :)

But anyway, thanks a lot for your input :)

Cheers



11/04/2007 - 11:50
Klapton
Klapton's picture
LHBA Member
Posts: 657
 Joined: 2007-08-16
I did a little searching on US greywater issues

I did a little searching and found at least one site that might provide some insight on greywater regulations in the US. http://www.oasisdesign.net/greywater/law/index.htm

It seems that regulation is the biggest problem here, and there are environmentally conscious folks fighting the good fight to eliminate governmental resistance. Here's one http://www.savemobile.org/ .

I'm sorry you didn't find more information from this community. Although we are the "Log Home Builders Association", we are mostly do-it-yourselfers. LHBA's main purpose is to teach ordinary people how to achieve their dream of log home living. A few go on to make log home building their profession, but for most of us, we will probably build our own home, and that's it. So if you were hoping to get lots of help from professional builders, it probably won't happen here. Best of luck with your project.

--

http://www.LarrysLogCabin.com/
LHBA Class of October, 2007
Status: Waiting to sell current home, planning