Friday, July 26, 2013

Would You Believe?

Because I have lived in urban and semi rural places all of my life, I, like many of you, took water and sewer for granted. It was just something that came with the house. Every house. Every house that I have ever lived in anyway.

Because I am married to a pump guy I knew that every time one turns on a tap a pump is running. Maybe not in your house but on your water line for sure.

What I did not know until we experienced the "making of a new house in a place that there once wasn't one" was how much stuff is necessary to make the house work. Behold, our mechanical room.

This is the Reverse Osmosis panel. This is all I know about this.
 
 This is the Reverse Osmosis Water Treatment thing. Antiscalant and Soda Ash tanks.
Whatever those are for. I think something about the PH levels. This unit
gives us purified water for the whole house. What I do know is that
it means we don't have any water spots in the shower or on the granite sinks.
 
 This has something to do with the septic system and the sewage mound.
The alarm on the top is very very loud when it goes off.
Of course it did go off once when Paul was in a meeting.
Oh joy.
 
 This is the air exchange system. I am not really sure how this works.
We have switches in the bathrooms, kitchen and laundry rooms. When
we put them on the fans run for 20 minutes and take the inside air out
and the outside air in.
 
 
 This is the boiler system. It heats the water for the sinks and showers
as well as the in floor heat in the basement.
 
 These are the rest of the lines to the in floor heat and the
hot water tank.
 
This is the furnace to which the air conditioner is attached.
It is also the central humidifier.
 
This is the 200 amp electrical panel. We were going to
go with 100 amp service. It was a good thing we didn't.
 
 And this is the water storage tank filled with
purified water. Good to know we have that much
reserve should something happen. I think it is
350 gallons or something.
 
So this is what is necessary to have power, gas, water and sewer out in the country.
I was stunned when I saw it all but not nearly as stunned
when the bills started coming in!
 
And now that we have finished the tours of the house and mechanical rooms
we can get on to more exciting things. Things like kittens and puppies and jam!




1 comment:

dawn klinge said...

That is impressive. I think I would like to be that self sufficient. Sometimes it's scary to think about how dependent we are on others for our most basic needs. After that initial expense, are you free from things like water and sewer bills?