Dual flush toilets, despite the amount of water they save, used to be quite costly to obtain (around three hundred dollars). Nowadays, though, you can convert the toilet you already have for about thirty dollars and a half hour of work.


Photo by Tom Arthur.

You may or may not be familiar with dual flush toilets—they tend to be used in more water-scarce areas, using two different methods of flushing (one for liquid waste, which requires less water to flush, and one for solid). With the release of dual flush retrofit kits, saving this much water is an easy task for anyone with a little DIY knowledge (and a standard 1.6 gallon toilet).


You'll have to remove the bolts that hold the water tank to the toilet bowl and disconnect the water line to remove the tank, but that's probably the most difficult part—replacing the actual hardware inside the tank isn't quite as daunting. It's quite worth it, too—you can probably save sixteen gallons a day for a family of five, which even if you're not too concerned about being green, is quite a money saver. Hit the link for more details, as well as some recommendations for kits.

How To Install a Dual Flush Conversion Retrofit Kit [HubPages]