Did you know that your garden can also act as a natural water treatment plant? Urban environmentalist and ecologist Indukanth Ragade talks about how you can cut water wastage by using greywater.
Debunking the age-old myth that the chemicals in greywater can harm your plants, he says, “The greywater from your household need not be treated for watering your garden plants.”
He advises that only kitchen and bathroom water is safe to use without treatment. Sewage water contains harmful organisms, so it must be treated in a sewage treatment plant (STP) before reuse.
While most plants thrive in greywater, he warns that ornamental and exotic plants with specific requirements of water, soil, and other resources might not grow well.
He informs that the bathroom runoff that is rich in organic compounds, like fatty acids, glycerol etc, which are technically composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, can be redirected to a small garden patch.
Alternatively, the kitchen wastewater can be absorbed into the soil. The soil layers will naturally purify it as it seeps down, eventually becoming clean groundwater that can be drawn out again.
“Your garden can be a natural water treatment plant. In traditional houses, this purpose was served by a dug well in the garden,” Ragade says.
He advocates that to completely reuse domestic greywater in gardening, only 2.5 sq ft of gardening soil is required per individual. “So, if there are four members in a family, they can channel their greywater towards a garden space of 10 sq ft,” he says.
He adds that a 2.5 sq ft garden space can absorb up to 50 to 60 litres of greywater.Moreover, he suggests that in urban areas such as apartments, households can divert their waste to their balcony garden pots.