Navy Showers: Water Saving Goes Hardcore

I was in the Navy for six years and while I did relish the opportunity to take long showers when I first got out I have since returned to taking Navy showers.

What good does the water do coming out of the shower head while you are are lathering up anyway?

There's a "navy shower" head that is both low-flow when water is flowing, and the water flow can be switched off right at the head - meaning you don't have to mess around with the taps. This makes it much easier for regulating temperature - no sudden blasts of hot or cold water to either scald or freeze you. Plus the head is "low-flow, high pressure", meaning it uses less water anyway, but still generates enough pressure to make you feel like your in a normal shower. We bought ours at Home Depot - although it was so long ago I can't remember what the product name is. It cost us about $20 Canadian.

When I was in the Navy and on the ship the the showerhead was attached to a hose. You had to hold a button down on the hose to make the water come out, hang the hose, soap up, grab the showerhead and rinse. It was always cold in the bathroom so you always showered super quickly. I've been out for over 5 years now but I still an used to taking a very quick shower.

I've always used this "navy shower", and I think it's pretty much the standard here in Portugal... Heck, I didn't even knew there was a name for it, and that people DIDN'T turn off the water when soaping...

After you get used to it, it feels ridiculous to let hot water go directly in the drain when soaping. And it's fun to be all covered with bubbles...

Sometimes, when it's cold, I take a bit more time to rinse.

Well of course, the most economical way of all is an Indian bucket bath. One bucket over the head, then you soap yourself down and use another bucket to wash yourself clean. Pretty easy when you get used to it.

It's simple, cheap and quick to install a push button valve right behind your showerhead. Just unscrew the showerhead, screw on the valve then screw on the shower head. Use teflon tape or pipe dope to seal the screw threads. Might take 10 minutes, tops.

I used one for years along with a low flow showerhead when I lived in the drought prone western US. There's really no downside. You can be sure that you're soaping up and not having to dodge away from the water stream - really helps in a tight shower.

One minor drawback is that water temperature may change for the first few seconds after you turnthe water back on. So point the showerhead away from you for a moment, or step out of the way, or leave the water trickling while you soap up.

I feel as though I get MUCH cleaner with this method. I don't like premature rinsing while I am sudsing up, anyhow.

We're full-time RVers, and have been for 8 years. In an RV, taking a shower like that is commonplace. Living without hookups in an RV teaches one the value of water (and energy) conservation. Now, couple that with living in the southwestern US desert where water is gold, and there's a definite need to take 'navy showers'.

I used the Navy Shower method when I had my chunk 'o dirt in Australia's outback where water is very scarce (courtesy of a solar shower bag - wonderful things). I found that I could use under a gallon of water for a really good shower. The only time it was uncomfortable was mid-winter... brrrrr :).

I'm in the same boat as the poster above: I have been "navy showering" all my life without even thinking about it. Here in the U.S., a lot of people do not mind leaving the water running unnecessarily when showering, shaving, or brushing their teeth. I never quite understood this. Maybe it has to do with the fact that water is still pretty cheap.

Thanks for making my Hugg entry Treehugger worthy! Keep up the great work guys. I love this site!

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editor note: Thanks for the Hugg entry, Jerry. Keep contributing good stuff!

Then there's the Philippine shower, a bucket and pot affair. You just pour the water over your head using a pot as a ladle. We use it when we hook up our solar heater- saves having complicated storage/ metering gadgets. Works nicely, saves energy and water too.

This is pretty common in Japan, too, where bathing is somewhat of a mix of the bucket method mentioned above, the Navy Shower method, and the regular, wasteful shower.

Well in some multiunit buildings/high-rises etc., it can cause major major plumbing problems if you shut off the flow totally at the shower head with such a retrofit "on-off button" or "suds valve" located at the shower head -- it can cause a "crossover" in the pipes where the hot water gets forced backwards into the cold water supply or vice versa due to possible pressure differences in the system. This can then result in scalding or freezing either yourself or your neighbors. So if you do do this, shut off the water using the faucet handles only -- don't use such a shut off button, unless it allows some water to still trickle out. That should leave enough to balance out a crossover.

What a great idea! I'll have to try this out! Though with all of the different things I often do in the shower - different face soap, different armpit soap, shaving...etc....it could be tricky.

But if I get it to work out, it could sure streamline the whole process! That would be a relief!

learned the navy shower from my father (he wasn't in the navy, just an early conservationist) years ago and am glad that lots of others use it, too! we had the shower with a shut-off valve growing up but have not been able to find a good one - can someone recommend a good brand that has decent water flow/pressure?

The problem is that you Freeeeeze when you turn the water off! I admit it, I'm lazy, I keep it running to stay warm!

Question: don't you freeze while lathering up? I would.

This is probably a healthier way to shower as well.

I've read that while safe for drinking, many water contaminants are dramatically more dangerous if inhaled. Water isn't regulated for water vapor safety. Inhaling water vapor favor for 15 minutes everyday of your life is probably not the best thing.

I first tried a navy shower after reading Clancy's 'The Hunt for Red October'. I used to be a military nut and thought it was cool for a bit when I was a teenager! I'll give it a go again and see if it's as fun as I remember it :P

At my old place I use to do this all the time as I had an in-line shut off valve (kinda like this one) so I didn't even have to mess up the shower's temperature.

Wow, it's great seeing all these comments.

Yah, ya might get a little cold. It can take some getting used to...but you could save a ton of water, even if you do it just a few times a week. Seems worth it? No?

I too have a few too many products in the shower and this did get tricky. It made me appreciate Dr. Bronners because I can use it to wash everything. :-)

J

Most showers at sea involve high pressure, button activated rinse.... so, be sure to calculate in how many Watts were used to bring the water up to rinse pressure when you're thinking about how much you're saving the environment...

...and finally, where do you suppose all that excess detergent goes once it's washed down the drain (oh, yeah, that's real good for the environment). Now figure in the manageability of super concentrated detergent waste vice liberally diluted detergent waste.

The absolute best thing that any one human can possibly do for the environment is put a gun to their head and pull the trigger.

To troll: In considering any solution, you must calculate the net effect on world happiness. The environment is only one aspect of this. While it is true that suicide is great for the environment, in most cases you'd be leaving behind grieving family and friends, which surely offsets the environmental savings by a good margin, thus resulting in an overall loss in world happiness.

Better than the push button shower head is a push button hand held model made by Alson. You can rinse with less water and pressure with the hand held and I believe it is the only push button hand held on the market. We are making them standard on the new houses we will be introducing later this year.

The same thing is done in the Coast Guard, but we called them "sea showers".

We took this one step further in summer camp - I always thought it was strange. We stood naked in line to get wet, got out, soaped up while waiting in line, and rinsed. Since we were pre-teen girls, there was another round for conditioner. My mind boggles at what video of this routine might be worth to some people.

I wonder how this compares with traditional japanese baths (or at least what I know of them). I have read that they keep a bath tub full of hot water.
1 walk into the bathroom
2 take a bucket of water from the bath tub
3 sit on a stool outside of the tub and poor it over your body. This gets the loose stuff off of your body
4 sit in the tub for 10 minutes soaking to loosen other dirt and grime
5 get out and lather
6 take another bucket and rinse

apparently multiple people would use the same water as it doesn't really get that dirty.

Clarification of above comment.

That's not how people take Japanese baths. You sit on a stool and pour a bucket of hot water over you. You lather up Outside of the tub. You rinse off with buckets Outside of the tub. Then once fully clean of dirt....Then you go into the tub of water, which is then reused by other people.

You do not sit, all dirty, in a tub of clean water in Japan. *shudder*

I have started taking navy showers after reading this post. It's really not hard to do (at least in summer). Just one little thing I can do every day! Thanks for posting this.

This may come off as totally gross, but why not shower less? In dry places you really do not need to shower every day, even if you work out, it's not good for your skin. I'm sure people consider it gross, but I probably shower every other day and wash my hair every 4 days and yes, I work in an office. It may be because I surf a lot (the salt water dries out your hair wicked bad) but it seems to work out fine for me, however I should note I grew up in Europe where such a bathing schedule was the norm

Re: freezing. Also compare the cost of keeping the shower room warm enough to do this. In the winter in a cool home (say under 15C/59F), part of the benefit of the shower is to warm your core body temperature via warming the large blood vessels to and from your head. (Hot tea can warm you inside as well, but then you can lose it if you have to undress to pee several times.)

The clothing styles you see in older pictures start to make more sense when you keep your home cool in winter, e.g., buttoned up or higher collars, indoor scarfs, sleeping stocking caps, tucking pants in your socks to keep from losing heat out the bottom of pant legs, wrist bands, gloves with open fingers, housecoats, etc. Think of the energy $ you'll be saving and you can splurge a little to get comfortable and styled clothes with these features.

Come to think of it, Japanese ofuro baths, scandanavian steam baths, etc. all probably had the important benefit of warming up the core body temperature periodically in winter without the cost of keeping the whole house warm continuously. We have better house insulation now, but with bigger houses and less winter clothing, some people have higher heating bills than necessary. Do we really need to keep all our non-food belongings warm, or just our bodies? our brains?

I grew up in Indonesia and have always use this technique of showering. Now i'm in the usa I still shower using this technique. I've always thought that this is the way to shower and before I read this article, I didn't know that ppl dont turn off their water while soaping. Thanks for the info.

I'm amazed that this is not called 'regular showering'. I have been doing this all my life and i don't understand how you can put on soap and wash while it is being rinsed off... In my 'navy' showers i use (with water saving showerhead) 4 liter or a bit more than 1 gallon per shower. (I measured it, yes, and i can do easily with even less but this is comfortable.)
I recently went on a camping trip and found another way to save even more water as this shower uses only about 1 liter: I used a hand-pressurized garden sprayer (what they usually use to spray chemicals with on plants). Granted, it's not ideal as the head is a bit too small but this concept could be worked on to provide a good 2 liter shower or about half a gallon... This is much more efficient than buckets or other devices.
(Besides that i have showered for the past 3 years almost exclusively with cold water summer/winter in all temperatures (except when ill) and nothing beats the great feeling afterwards!)

Have been doing "Navy"-showers myself most of my life without even knowing it had a name :-)

It's a pretty standard way to shower here in Thailand, and we're not saving water or anything, it just feel more reasonable.

I learned this technique when in Jamaica for a missions trip... didn't know it had a name, but like someone was saying it would be much more convenient with a shower head that had a valve on it to shut off. That way you don't mess up your water adjustments when showering.

hi i am 8 years old and i became super green i saved 200 gallons of water i saved 82 hours of energy and saved 45 trees i love this site keep up the good work for now bye

The rest of the world showers like this but your navy invented it?
"Navy showers" may take getting used to, but they're surely more efficient- why try to lather up if it gets washed away immediately? It makes more sense, but I lived in a cold climate and understand the hesitation. It's really something you get accustomed to over time. Try it a couple times a week to start.

Here's another tip. In the summer turn down the temp on your water. I sleep all night without the A.C. By washing my hair and opening the window. Another thing you can do is put a bucket in the shower with you to catch some of the water you do use. I would use this for my plants or for flushing the toilet.
Also washing with a buddy saves even more. Gosh I'm all inspired now!!