Multi-Family Residential (Apartments and Condominiums)
Our roots are in the Multi-family residential sector. Over the past 25 years, Water Management personnel have entered occupied residential units over a million times to replace or fix plumbing fixtures. We currently service over 40,000 residential units, which are equipped with nearly every type and style of fixture. We have come to know which products work the best and how to make any product work at its best. We routinely reduce consumption 30-50 percent, while improving user satisfaction with the appearance, cost and performance of the plumbing system.
Why is there a need for Water Management?
Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute claims the building industry suffers from “Infectious Repetatitus”. In order to compete for sales, builders have to build what their competitors build at a lower cost. So, they naturally look for building components that cost less to buy, not those that cost less to maintain or those that will perform well after the guarantee period has expired. So, the good builder efficiently builds an inefficient building.
Case in point is the “builders grade” toilets installed in the Virginia Square Apartments built in 2001 in Arlington, Virginia. -- owned and managed by the Dittmar Company. When this upscale facility was first occupied, daily water consumption was less than 100 gallons per unit. By 2003, the daily consumption had grown to twice that amount. Since we had completed many successful programs on Dittmar’s older buildings, they asked us to investigate the Virginia Square complex.
We attached our data logger to the water meter, which recorded the consumption throughout the night. We discovered that the building was using 17.5 gallons of water per minute in the middle of the night when water use is expected to approach zero. There were no obvious leaks in the mechanical room, so we entered some apartments and discovered numerous small leaks in toilet flush and fill valves.
Water Management upgraded the flush and fill valves, which resulted in reducing water consumption to 80 gallons/day – less than the units were using when the building was first occupied. Upgrading the 295 toilets at Virginia Square Apartments took three weeks and is now saving the Dittmar Company over $50,000.
The manufacturer of the new toilets did not have to pay the increased water bill. The specifying Engineer and the installing plumber did not have to pay either. They were providing a specified product that was well installed. The developer saved a few dollars by specifying “builder grade” parts. The end user got a good price on the product, but in the end paid a very high cost. Yet, it is hard to blame any of the parties, they are just responding to their particular market pressure.
Our market pressure is different, Water Management has to find and use products that perform on a life-cycle basis.
