News Reporter: Climate Coach: How I discovered the perfect shower

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Climate Coach
Down-to-earth advice for life on our changing planet.

Presented by Battelle

(Aart-Jan Venema for The Washington Post)

By By Michael J. Coren

Welcome. This week, the black-footed ferret's last stand and essential sand dunes. But first, how I discovered the perfect shower.

Several years ago, I moved into a condo in San Francisco. My wife said we might not be able to stay. Stepping into the shower, we were greeted by a sad trickle rather than a blast of water. No amount of fiddling was of any help. The plumber said there was nothing he could do.

An online search led to salvation: hundreds of specialized nozzles that amp up water pressure even with meager volumes of water. Soon, we rinsed the shampoo out of our hair with ease. I confidently unpacked my things.

Most of us assume more water means a better shower. But that's not true. Today's high-pressure shower heads are designed to deliver the same experience once requiring three times as many gallons per minute — or as Consumer Reports suggests, a better one.

But these thrifty shower heads not only use less water. Because they do so while delivering a satisfying jet, they might also encourage you to turn off the faucet sooner, saving even more water. Higher pressure appears to entice people to spend less time showering than lower-pressure, a recent U.K. study suggests.

You and the environment win.

Here's how to upgrade to a water-saving solution we may all be able to agree on.

What is a low-flow shower head?

Regulators tried to reduce water waste in the mid-1990s by mandating more efficient shower heads. While succeeding at reducing their average flow rate from 5.5 gallons per minute to 2.5 gallons per minute (gpm), early models were awful. Users complained of weak water streams. One Seinfeld episode about "low flow" left Kramer and Newman unable to wash shampoo out of their hair. The culprit? Manufacturers merely added gaskets restricting water flow, instead of redesigning shower heads to work at these new flow rates.

But since then, almost all manufacturers have gotten better at saving water without sacrificing performance, redesigning nozzles to work best at low-flow rates, said David Malcolm, founder of High Sierra Showerheads, a manufacturer specializing in low-flow designs. "We're trying to create ideal spray and droplet size at the ideal pressure," he says.

Why are these important?

Showers account for roughly 20 percent of total household water consumption. And water is just the start of it. Your shower burns energy, too. Just under half of a home's hot water is used for showering. But the EPA's WaterSense standard of 2.0 gallons per minute (gpm) or less is expected to cut about $5 billion off our national water and energy bill, states the agency.

These shower heads may deliver benefits in another way: Everyone taking shorter showers.

How does pressure affect the length of showers?

Ian Walker, an environmental psychology professor at the University of Surrey in Guildford, England, tracked 86,000 individual showers as part of a recent study. The median lasted six minutes (although the range stretched from 30 seconds to more than an hour). By using sensors to track temperature, pressure and water consumption, they were able to see how different types of showers affected water consumption.

One consistent finding stood out: The higher the pressure, the shorter the shower. On average, total water consumption fell as shower pressure rose, mainly because people spent less time under the water, according to their findings in a preprint undergoing peer review.

How much water does this save?

Crucially, more powerful streams of water consumed as much as 60 percent less water overall — with the most savings from shower heads that combined high pressure with a low water flow. "No one had any idea pressure would do this," says Walker. "At any given flow rate, high pressure is better."

What does this mean for you?

More research is needed to answer key questions: Why are high-pressure showers shorter? What other factors affect shower duration? Will these findings translate in the average home?

But the bottom line is you can now save water without having to compromise: Upgrading your shower head can cost less than $20. "Our testing found that water flow really doesn't predict performance," says Bernie Deitrick, a test engineer for Consumer Reports. "In fact, the two best shower heads we tested earned top marks for both shower feel and water consumption, and the top model used only about half the legal limit."

It may be one of the best $20 investments you can make in your home. It was for me.

Write me with your water-saving experiences at climatecoach@washpost.com. I read all your emails.

Click here to read the column

Field Sample

Winters are warming faster than any other season. The normally frigid northern reaches of the United States are thawing already this year as lakes become ice-free far earlier than normal.

Declining snowfall and ice cover are a symptom of this warming, but also a driver. It's a stark feedback loop threatening to banish winter in places that were once in a deep freeze well into the spring, from Montana to Maine.

See a visual exploration of our thawing planet by The Post's Scott Dance and Simon Ducroquet.

Learning Curve

We've never seen sea surface temperatures like this before. While El Niño, the climate pattern known for warming up the Pacific Ocean, has contributed to this spike, the marine heat waves have continued for months on end, spreading across nearly all of the oceans' surfaces.

With the unprecedented streak of ocean heat entering a second year, scientists say we could be headed into a major new era in Earth systems irreversible on any human time scale.

Gavin Schmidt, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, says what they've observed in the oceans "doesn't add up."

Ocean temperatures could cool off later this year with La Niña conditions forecast to return. If not, Schmidt says "the world will be in uncharted territory."

The Second Degree

Readers had plenty of tips on nest boxes from last week's column on how to give birds safe shelter from cleaning out next boxes once the inhabitants have left for the season to adding debris piles that give shelter for all sorts of birds — just put out last year's grasses and winter's dead branches in a pile.

Others suggested only cutting the top of dead or dying trees. "I now have new feathered neighbors nesting in hollow cavities and the trees are in no danger of toppling over," commented one reader. "If you have to cut trees down for safety, leave the bottom 20' as homes for the birds!" Another reader, Michael Casey, who did the same, said woodpeckers moved in: "One has three huge holes in it," he wrote. "We call it the woodpecker high-rise."

And more tips for cheap housing upgrades have rolled in:

Diane Ingalls covers thick cardboard used for science project displays with fabric in front of her fireplace during the colder months, then stashes it out of sight. Jim Adcock of Washington recommended buying a small $10 package of fiberglass insulation to fill any gaps in walls or floors as an easy fix. "Payback time: about three months," he wrote, "and then you are earning 'money for nothing' while making your home more comfortable to live in!"

And who's doing March Madness? I created a "climate bracket" for teams striving to take home a national championship based on the greenhouse emissions required to fly to the final match at State Farm Stadium in Arizona. The Post's resident data nerd Andrew Van Dam and I are vying for the title to world's nerdiest NCAA bracket. May the best nerd win.

On the Climate Front

From The Post:

See one cherry tree's rush to an early bloom, day by day.

Dunes aren't just big piles of sand. Here's why Earth needs them.

Here's how to go vegan in South Korea, a meat lover's paradise.

U.S. fully banned asbestos, while two-thirds of Chicago kids under 6 are exposed to lead in water.

From elsewhere:

The black-footed ferret is on the edge of extinction, and Travis Livieri may be the only one standing between it and oblivion.

The heat index is rising much faster than temperatures in Texas, reports Yale E360: It's 11 degrees hotter on hot summer days.

Bloomberg debunks claims suggesting EVs aren't cleaner than gasoline cars.

People hate the idea of car-free cities — until they live in one, argues Wired.

Here's Miska eating one of her favorite snacks. Unlike cats, dogs, like humans, are "opportunistic carnivores," says John Bauer, a professor of clinical nutrition at the Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences.

That means they will eat meat or plants depending on what's available. Domestic dogs can be vegetarians, and "if done properly, it is just as healthy as an omnivorous diet is for a dog."

Miska still eats a mixed diet, but she's trying some of the plant-based kibble on the market. So far, she's a fan. 🥕

Send me your photos of your pets' favorite snacks at climatecoach@washpost.com