Lately, my household has been focused on our water consumption. Our bill jumped up significantly this month, with no obvious culprit. We only use the dishwasher every other day, use bath and cooking water to give our plants a drink and do our laundry in larger loads. So we’ve decided to try finding all the small ways we can conserve water.
This is also motivated by the fact that we live in the metro Atlanta area, and most of our water comes from Lake Lanier. The lake’s levels have been extremely low for more than a year, prompting water restrictions in some counties.
These beautiful Stone Ice Cubes by Nordic Rock may not reduce our water bill by leaps and bounds, but it’s sure to help if we quit using the ice maker. These rocks can simply be placed in the freezer about an hour before you need them, and voila! Cold drinks with no melting or wasted water. Because I’d probably forget to put them in when I needed them, I’d just leave them in the freezer all the time. They would also make a unique, stylish addition to dinner parties.
My biggest qualm: They come in a leather case. Since I’ve been trying to avoid leather like the plague unless it’s vintage or recycled, that’s a big turn off for me. Maybe I can get them to ship in something else…
Why It’s Green:
- Made of natural base rock
- Reduces water consumption by replacing traditional ice cubes
Price: £15.99 or about $26 for a set of 10
SOURCE: Lovely Room
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I’m Jennae Petersen, and I’m a lot of things. A mother, a graphic artist, a connosieur of beautiful interiors and a purveyor of all things design. Green Your Decor was borne of frustration in my attempts to find eco-friendly housewares that were also beautiful, and inspiration to do something to reduce my own carbon footprint and help others do the same in a beautiful way.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
How do these save water? If you put Ice in a glass of water it will melt and umm become water that you drink. If the ice cubes don’t fully melt before you are done, put the unmelted cubes in a plant. I can see how they could help save electricity by not running an icemaker.
off topic: but how do you save the bath water ?
D. Psykos last blog post..Waste Land
How do they stay clean though? Don’t you risk breaking your glass? These look neat but I don’t see how they can be practical
Rebecca Cs last blog post..Giveaways 10/24
This is a cool idea. But i might have issues with hygiene here. I know you can wash it. But still the same…
Lots of great questions, guys!
@D. Psycho When my daughter takes a bath, we leave the water in the tub until we need it. Then we scoop it out with a large container to water the plants. When we shower, we try to keep a bucket in there with us (when we remember) to catch lots of excess water.
@Andrew You definitely make a good point. I still think it has water saving potential though, as the ice comes from water we wouldn’t necessarily have been using otherwise. It also saves the water from all the ice that’s sitting in the freezer unused. And because lots of people tend to toss drinks when they get watered down, the potential to drink that water is lost. But all of these are “ifs,” I guess.
@Rebecca C. and che I think it would be pretty easy to keep them clean. I could see putting them in the dishwasher, and they’d be just as clean as the glasses you drink from. Alternatively, you could sit them in boiling water for a few minutes, like you would do with a baby’s bottles. As for breaking the glass, I honestly hadn’t thought of that. We rarely use glasses at our house thanks to having a toddler around, so I hadn’t considered the dangers of using the rocks in glass cups. I guess if you were very careful not to drop them heavily, they would work. But you’re absolutely right — that doesn’t seem practical.
Given all the questions they’ve brought up and with benefit of 20/20 hindsight, these do seem like a lot more trouble than they’re worth. Definitely a possibility, but do I really want to have to think this much about cooling my drinks? Not really, and I’m guessing most of you will agree