Having regular water audits done at your business can help track how much water is being used throughout the business and which practices or areas of the business require the most usage of water.
The auditor can tell you where you are wasting water and provide further methods to help curb on the water usage should you find out your business is using more water than you can afford.
To find a business water auditor, you can visit this website auditing business water usage where you can find more information on hiring a water auditor.
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What does the Business Water Audit Entail?
Requesting a business water audit means taking a review of all the business’s infrastructure, how much water is used, where their supply is coming from and the drainage facilities.
These water audits are important for your business as they help with water usage estimation, help avoid overcharging and can check for duplicate invoices. There are two types of business water audits done, a water-saving devices audit and a comprehensive audit.
The comprehensive audit is mainly aimed at the food and beverages industry, these audits also check the quality of the water you are using, can check your equipment such as the pipeworks, spray nozzles and valves as well as checking the mechanical systems, maintenance and even irrigation of the business to ensure that no water has been wasted in the processes.
This can also lead you to diverting all grey water from washing machines, sinks and dishwashers to help flush toilets instead of wasting it down the drain.
These audits will show the amount of water usage and estimate how much you will save if you choose to use the water saving recommendations. The water saving audit assesses where you could save more water by reducing wastage in the business.
How is a Business Water Audit done?
There are five steps that need to be taken to do a water audit.
1. Take inventory of the water used
The first thing that you need to do is keep a record of the following information to make sure how much water you are using. This will help you understand the business water usage and you have to keep a record and list all the equipment and fixtures that you have within the business.
Take notes of the flow rate, which fixtures use which types of water, either hot or cold, if the business uses recycled water, whether you need filtered or treated water and if your business has any flow restrictors.
If your business has boilers or cooling towers, you need to keep record of how much water they use and depending on the type of refrigeration some of these use less water.
For your irrigation systems you need to record the flow rate of each system and the number of heads that each system has.
2. Track your water metre
Another way of being able to check how much water your business is using is to track all the metres in the business.
There are submetres that can be found on any specialised equipment such as boilers and cooling towers, this means that your standard water metres tracks how much water is going from your main water metre inside the business and these submetres can track how much water is being used per process/equipment.
You have to frequently check your metres to notice how your usage increases or decreases overtime. You can also use your water bill to check the water usage amount and work from that number if you had your business running for a long time.
3. Establish ways and methods to monitor and maintain water usage
After establishing how much water is used at your business, you now need to have someone monitor and control the water usage going forward.
Constantly check the equipment and valves for leaks to ensure that no water is being wasted. For specialised equipment you need to check them often to make sure that they are not using too much water and still using the proper flow rates.
Set out a plan for repairs so that your employees understand what they need to do should a problem arise.
4. Set business goals to save water
Once you have an understanding of how much water is being used. You can now implement methods to save water and set realistic goals for your employees so that they can reach them.
You can even start rewarding the employees that ensure that water is being saved.
5. Identify cheaper water saving improvements within the business
Use water saving techniques that aren’t going to be expensive to maintain.
The Benefits of having Business Water Audits
Below are just some of the benefits of potential saving when you have a business audit done.
- Water and wastewater tariff review
- High water consumption issues
- Metre standing charges
- Property drainage charges
- Rateable value charges
- Site area/band charges
- Investigation of trade effluent consents and discharge rates
- Verification of allowances
Costs of having a water audit done?
To have a business water audit done is free and you aren’t obligated to it. If your water audit shows no savings to be made then you do not pay a fee, however if the auditor suggests some water saving tips that changes your water consumption then a fee is discussed beforehand with the client.
Conclusion
Having a water audit done for your business can help you reduce water wastage even if you were already saving.
The above steps can be done by yourself or a professional water auditor. You can follow the steps and still find a water auditor to check that you have done the process properly.
You can also visit different business water audit company websites to find easy to implement water saving methods that you can use within your business.