Talk:Low-flush toilet

Doubtful figures

Regarding the Problems section: There is obviously a problem with the numbers -I checked the source article, but I'm still not convinced. 20 million gallons reduction is a very small quantity that shouldn't cause any difference (especially not a problem) to any sewage network. That's less than 0.1 gallon per person and per day. I would expect the savings to be at least 10 times -and even in that case, I don't see any real problem. Even the amount of bleach that they state is an indication that there is something wrong with the numbers. I don't know how to handle this, though. Remove the secion, maybe? Cangelis (talk) 12:44, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes. HiLo48 (talk) 19:52, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

I added a reference from an engineering study where 189 apartments had high efficiency toilets installed, and that complex alone saved four million gallons per year. Admittedly, the reference is hosted on the site of a toilet manufacturer, but the data was provided by a third party and looks valid. K8 fan (talk) 02:00, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Have you had a chance to look at my reference? I believe the numbers supplied for a single apartment complex makes the number supposedly representing the savings for all of San Francisco suspect.K8 fan (talk) 03:30, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Change the name of this article

I would suggest that the name of this article displays a bias. The industry term is a "high efficiency toilet" and a Google search produced 3,260,000 results while "low flow toilet" produced only 1,880,000 results. Also, the US Environmental Protection Agency sponsors the WaterSense program to encourage adoption of high efficiency toilets, and that is the term they use. This article should be re-named "high efficiency toilet" K8 fan (talk) 02:06, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Coming from a country where the toilets described in this article are standard, in fact even mandated in most areas, I've been tempted for some time to suggest changing this article to just "toilet", and the other form to "water wasting toilet", but I know about the prevailing American view in this area. While, again, I'll point out that this is a global encyclopaedia and should avoid purely American naming conventions where it can, your suggestion is a nice compromise. HiLo48 (talk) 02:26, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. I'm not sure what the term is in the UK and other English-speaking countries, but "high efficiency toilet" seems reasonably NPOV. By the way, is there a WP standard for posting video? I would like to shoot footage of this pressure vessel in action. It really is impressive, firing one gallon of water in less than three seconds. K8 fan (talk) 03:24, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

K8 fan: I've requested that your photos of the "Flushmaster" be removed from the Sloan Valve Company page. Sloan does not sell a "Flushmaster"; it's called Flushmate, and that's produced by a separate company. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sginterline (talk • contribs) 18:22, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Sorry high efficiency toilet is a far more POV term than low flush toilet. Granted that that both "high efficiency" and "low" are both comparative terms and thus subject to POV. While the industry terms are probably the best choice for an encylopedia, the industry consensus should not necessarily be the final say on the matter considering the boader scope of encyclopedic terminology..because this is not an encyclopedia specific to that industry. As your colleague points out, the industry term in the USA does not even apply to the rest of the world because, for example, in parts of Europe these designs have become so standard that it has simply replaced the generic term "toilet". Since one obvious purpose of this article is to make a distinction between the old versus "improved" design standards(and some of the driving forces that made it revolutionary), I think it should be more appropriate to use the original terms relative to the scope of the article especially where they are culturally relevant. Where specific terms are used in any public hearings etc., and if its necessary due to the changing terminology in various sectors then a specific section may be ideal to track as many of those terms as is necessary and possible for any references to examples and upgrades that have a distinct vocabulary. For example It could be a section called proliferation", "globalization","implementation","standards adoption", "innovations" or such. Because this technology is an upgrade from an original technology and technologies have a tendency to grow and modify rapidly, its unlikely to find a npov term that is also in widespread use, so its most fair in such case to stick with the original terms, whatever they may be,whenever appropriate but make a specific section on trends and the industry changes or effects on the industry and thus the associated terminologies and improvements deviating the original implemented designs. If you start from a basic and efficient modular format then any updates and improvements can be easily incorporated into the article without much overhaul. Thats my theory at least. In any case if its a serious issue about the changing the name or terms for these the devices that should be referenced and should be an issue covered as a specific subject of the article, an example being: chronicling any notable industry and cultural movements or litigation proceedings to actually force a institutional re vocabulary of the device for official or patent related reasons.73.176.113.121 (talk) 07:18, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. That they have a low flow rate per flush is a simple matter of fact, while the overall efficiency will vary by design. Some early ones required multiple flushes to get the job done, so were actually less efficient. StuRat (talk) 07:03, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

I own several high efficiency toilets that use less that 1.6 gallons per flush. The ones I use transfer more water through the waterway in a shorter period of time than the older 5 gallon units - i.e. greater efficiency. The early ones that failed attempted to use gravity to push the water through the system, and 1.6 gallons of water simply doesn't have enough mass. I'm not sure that any toilets are still sold that don't use pressure vessels.K8 fan (talk) 23:38, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I came here as I was surprised the article title is "Low-flush toilet" but the article starts out with "low-flow toilet" in bold and then uses both "low-flush" and "Low-flow" throughout the article body.

• "low-flush" appears once in the article and "low flush" is also used once. (total two times)
• "low-flow" appears six times in the article including the first sentence where it's bolded and "low flow" is used three times. (total nine times)
• "high efficiency" appears once and without the hyphen.
• "ultra low flow" appears once (and is also counted as "low flow" above.
• None of the counts listed here include the usage from reference titles. One reference uses "low-flow" in its title. Another reference is reported as using "low flush" in its title in the reference-citation but the source article is a graphic that uses "dual-flush", "WaterSense", and "pressure-assist." The phrase "low-flow", "low-flush", nor "high efficiency" does not appear in that source.
• Template:Toilets uses "Low-flush".

I get a sense that some people call them "low flow", others use "low flush", and still others "high efficiency" (all with and without the hyphens). WP:COMMONNAME suggests using Google Books and News Archive over plain old Google to help spot if a particular name or phrase is more common:

Phrase	Google	Google Books	Google News
"low flow toilet"	353,000[1]	3,370[2]	396[3]
"low-flow toilet"	353,000[4]	3,000[5]	396[6]
"low flow toilets"	247,000[7]	3,750[8]	3,530[9]
"low-flow toilets"	248,000[10]	3,750[11]	3,530[12]
"low flush toilet"	75,000[13]	1,680[14]	134[15]
"low-flush toilet"	75,000[16]	1,670[17]	134[18]
"low flush toilets"	96,100[19]	3,890[20]	512[21]
"low-flush toilets"	98,000[22]	3,890[23]	511[24]
"high efficiency toilet"	153,000[25]	330[26]	171[27]
"high-efficiency toilet"	154,000[28]	330[29]	171[30]
"high efficiency toilets"	118,000[31]	866[32]	565[33]
"high-efficiency toilets"	119,000[34]	865[35]	565[36]
"water efficient toilet"	12,400[37]	178[38]	53[39]
"water-efficient toilet"	12,400[40]	178[41]	53[42]
"water efficient toilets"	39,900[43]	404[44]	217[45]
"water-efficient toilets"	39,900[46]	404[47]	217[48]

I marked the highest counts in yellow. The main thing value learned is that there is no consensus. Much of the "low-flow toilets" coverage in the news seems to stem from California governor Jerry Brown's April 1, 2015 and the resulting April 8, 2015 announcement from the California Energy Commission. Neither the governor's office nor the Energy Commission uses the phrase "low flush/flow" or any similar phrase. It's a puzzle on why the news coverage is predominantly "low-flow toilets."

I decided be WP:BOLD and changed "low flow" to "low-flow", "low flush to "low-flush", and "high efficiency" to "high-efficiency" reducing the number of different phrases used in the article from five to three. I also added mention that "low-flow toilet" and "high-efficiency toilet" are common phrases to the initial sentence.

I believe the article would be better if we stuck with one phrase. I personally lean towards "high-efficiency" as a generic phrase as "low-flow" in English often means a fluid that flowing slowly while "low-flush" means it only flushes out a little bit. A concern with "high-efficiency" is that it's not as commonly used per Google Books. --Marc Kupper|talk 01:09, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

A data point that may help us decide is that the phrase "low-flow shower head" is common and so it would make sense that water saving toilets would be called "low-flow toilets." I was reading the EPA's WaterSense Labeled Toilets page and see that they use "Water–Efficient Toilet". That phrase seems more neutral. I updated the table above to include that phrase. --Marc Kupper|talk 01:33, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

General improvements desirable.

While I'm not fully familiar with the standards of stub-class articles, it became immediately obvious to me that the section of the article was in need of vast grammatical and style improvement..it rather reads like a pamphlet promoting the innovation and one company in particular. I'll make one edit as an example and let others more familiar with the topic do more as they see fit. It took me a couple of readings but I believe I have correctly re-construed the sentence "Although, technology have come along way since then [1993 or the 1980s? not sure which the author meant here so I just did away with the "since then" portion and made it a general statement] and in saving the world and the fresh water supplies. Ultra low-flush toilets that the Swedish company Wostman Ecology have constructed since 1993 years of technology. Is without any doubt the most ecological solution; Eco flush use only 0.6 liters (0.16 gallons) per average flush, Eco Dry and Eco vac(uum) go even lower than that, down to only 0.3 liters per average flush (0.08 gallons)" to be an attempt to say: "Although technologies have come along way in saving and conserving the world's fresh water supplies, Ultra low-flush toilets such as those constructed by the Swedish company Wostman Ecology since 1993, are without any doubt the most ecological solution; Eco flush use only 0.6 liters (0.16 gallons) per average flush, Eco Dry and Eco vac(uum) go even lower than that, down to only 0.3 liters per average flush (0.08 gallons)" I'm not an expert and can't devote the time needed to improve the structure of the paragraph that I have now also probably turned into a run on sentence but its still an improvement from what was there nonetheless...I am by no means certain if I have construed this paragraph correctly but the way it was written, even following this edit, still conveys a strong non neutral statement...and actually,if it were left as originally written, included a completely unverifiable and fanciful statement about "saving the world". I have to assume it was not meant to be read in that way. note I also adjusted the sentence: "In 1988 Massachusetts became the first state in the country to mandate the use of low flow toilets in new construction and remodeling. In 1992, U.S. President George H. W. Bush signed the Energy Policy Act. to read less locally centric manner: "In 1988, Massachusetts became the first state in the U.S.A. to mandate the use of low flow toilets in new construction and remodeling. In 1992, U.S. President George H. W. Bush signed the Energy Policy Act." because relative to the rest of the article it seemed to assume the reader is also located in the USA and would know which country was being referred to in its opening statement, though it would seem obvious with the reference to Massachusetts it would not be so obvious to someone who is not familiar with the state, or which country it belongs to..a simple word change that makes alot of difference. Though it may have been appropriate if the article were already broken down into national and regional sections like I've seen in other wiki articles, it should have as much of a geographically neutral writing style as possible until/if that is implemented.73.176.113.121 (talk) 08:23, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

73.176.113.121, I could see adding a new section for "Legislation in the United States" that includes the Energy Policy Act of 1992, WaterSense, Massachusetts, etc. and to remove mention of these entirely from the lead. If someone finds similar information for other countries or the EU, they would be added as their own sections.