Most of us residential users irrigate our properties at night -- or at least we should, since evaporation during the day wastes a lot of water. That means we're probably asleep when the sprinklers come on. Admit it -- when was the last time you got up to watch your sprinklers at 4am? How long would it take you to realize you have a broken underground pipe, or a malfunctioning sprinkler head? As several of us here at EveryDrop can testify -- it can be a long time!
In one case one of our homeowners had a leak that resulted in excess water charges of $2000! Another person didn't realize she had a leak until the water utility called and said "there might be a leak on your property."
Here are some fun facts. According to the EPA's WaterSense program, residential irrigation in the U.S. accounts for almost 9 billion gallons of water per day, or about a third of all household water use. Up to 50% of that irrigation water is WASTED through inefficient systems, evaporation, wind, or runoff. Crazy, right? We need to conserve every drop of this precious declining resource.
The price of water varies a lot by region and by usage tier, but for example, water in Denver can cost about $7 per 1000 gallons. Let's say you have a leak of 5 gallons per minute (our 1" meters can measure flow rates between 1 gpm and 30 gpm). In a 24 hour period that's 7200 gallons, or over 50,000 gallons in a week! You're talking about a cost of water in the hundreds of dollars -- far exceeding the cost of an EveryDrop flow meter.
That kind of leak might, if you're lucky, become visible after a while. But what about a sprinkler head that is not working correctly and emits 50% more water than it should? You'd probably never know, other than maybe to say to yourself, "that grass sure is looking very green this year!" And once the system shuts off for the day, there's little remaining evidence of of a problem.
The opposite case could also be bad. If you have a malfunctioning emitter that is not producing enough water, you'll notice it -- once you have dead grass, flowers, or vegetables. By then it could be too late.
The key here is to know how much water your system is supposed to be using. A smart controller, like those from Rachio that we know and love, combined with an EveryDrop flow meter, can tell you if a particular zone is producing too much or too little water, or if water continues to flow after it's supposed to be shut off.
A flow meter is a small investment in peace of mind. Our mission is to make this technology affordable enough so that every homeowner can include it in their system, either up front when designing a new irrigation plan, or retroactively to monitor an older, working installation.