Conservation is focus for toilet makers

Earlier models failed to thrill consumers.

By DINESH RAMDE

ASSOCIATED PRESS

KOHLER, Wis. — For clients of Scott Kelly’s architecture firm, seeing — and going — are believing.

His Philadelphia company urges its customers to install high-efficiency toilets, which use 20 percent less water than the previous generation of low-flow toilets. So the firm installed one such toilet in its own restroom, and customers who try it out are impressed.

“Literally after one use, they love it: the seat, the look, the fact that it saves water,” said Kelly, of Re:Vision Architecture.

With droughts parching the nation’s southeast and chronic water shortages drying out the West Coast, water utilities across the country say they’re grateful for recent advances in the toilet industry, and a number of state governments are moving toward mandating the use of the water-saving commodes.

Among the manufacturers leading the way are TOTO USA, a Japanese company with U.S. headquarters in Morrow, Ga., and Kohler Co., based in southeast Wisconsin.

Toilets built 30 years ago guzzled five or more gallons of water per flush, but in the early 1980s manufacturers designed new models that needed only 3 1/2 gallons per flush. Congress emphasized further conservation in 1992 when it passed the Energy Policy Act, which mandated that regular toilets made starting in 1994 use 1.6 gallons.

Consumers weren’t pleased with those early low-flow models. The first flush didn’t always clear the bowl, and subsequent flushes negated any water savings.

But the newest generation of high-efficiency toilets — developed in the last two to seven years — does the job on the first try, and uses only 1.3 gallons per flush, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“The technology is ready, it’s been tested and it’s receiving rave reviews from customers,” EPA spokesman Benjamin Grumbles said. “There’s real enthusiasm for high-efficiency toilets. Water conservation is really the wave of the future.”