Urinals
Urinals typically use less water than WCs, but can still waste a lot of water if incorrectly installed. Typically, urinals account for about 20% of office water use. Water consumption is controlled by regulation however, actual consumption levels can vary significantly. Waterless urinals are a recent development that use no water other than for cleaning.
Water efficient urinals are very affordable to install in both new projects and refurbishments and their maintenance costs are typically less than those for standard
urinals. Payback periods are often very favourable.
Urinal controls
Urinals operating without controls can use four times as much water as is necessary.
Urinals can be controlled according to time (e.g. set to operate during working hours), movement or mechanical movement triggers (e.g. a door opening, a tap being turned on or a person entering the washroom).
For larger washrooms it is important to use separate controls for each urinal, to prevent all the bowls being flushed from a single use.
Installing urinal controls is not sufficient alone, systems need to be commissioned and periodically tested to ensure that they are operating as intended.
Waterless urinals
A range of urinals use no water. Some systems are supplied as a complete unit whilst others can be fitted to standard bowls and troughs. There are a variety of
forms of waterless urinal:
- those with disposable chemical traps
- those with permeable one-way valves that seal the urinal opening
- those that create a negative air pressure to take odour from the washroom
Waterless urinals are simple to install and have no complex controls or plumbing exposed to potential damage or vandalism.
Waterless urinals also address scale, odour and flooding problems. Odour is often incorrectly perceived to be a problem with waterless urinals, so most manufacturers offer a scented block, stick or pad.
Waterless urinals typically require little maintenance and are increasingly being used in public facilities such as football stadiums and schools.
Installing waterless urinals can save 20% of office water use! Waterless urinals are comparable in cost to standard units, whilst installation and maintenance costs are typically lower than flushing urinals.