Anyone Have Experience with Gray Water?

[paulsharvey]

But, you know what strips sediment And nutrien? Grass, vegetation, ect.

On top of that, we have a 275 gal water supply, so, I'm guessing we are talking 20-50 water usage per day, or way under the average.

So, yeah, get the wet area away from the structure, and then do what feels right. Anything is better than nothing, but honestly, nothing will also work fine, as long as its 50 ft from the structure.

Edit: way back up top, OP says 300-500 gal per Month... that likely is way too low. It really is likely closer to 20-30 gal per day, if you are Extremely careful with water usage. If its more relaxed, maybe 50g per day or 1500 gal per month. Doesn't change anything, those are tiny numbers compared to a fully functional home, that uses 70-110 gal per person per day.

 

[Jstpssng]

Wow, people take their gray water seriously... Anyways, its about nutrient load more than bacteria, and yes, there is nutrien load in gray water, from soaps, sweet, ect. Septic system does a good job of stripping nutrient load. Atleast here, the regs are mostly about keeping nutrien out of the open waters, which leads to algae blooms.

But, for our OP, its pretty irrelevant. One home, or a single show is having basically zero effect. 50,000 gray water systems in a county, with a common drainage basin, absolutely

Some of these comments have made me wonder what people are getting into, and washing off in the shower.

 

[Rock Crawler]

I have a buddy with a camp that 30 years ago, they dug a 4'X4'x4' hole and filled it with river rock. They built the cabin over it, and plumbed a natural spring to a tank, and use a demand pump like you mention to shower and use a bathroom and kitchen sink. They use an old time in ground outhouse for #1/#2. He says that in 30+ years, this system has worked fine and they have never seen water coming out of the hole.

Based on his story, I copied his hole and built a shed with a shower stall and laundry tray for washing dishes, hands, brushing teeth. I've been 3 years like this and no issues. I am also using the propane instant water heater (GasLand, from Amazon) and I use 2 275 gallon IBC totes for my water storage. I also have an in ground, old school, semi truck tire lined outhouse for doing the business.

Zero odors, no problem with animals or insects.