Why is it not used again and wouldn’t it be very efficient to combine with a heat pump for reuse?
Especially since water from shower or sink isn’t usually very dirty, couldn’t it be stored for a while in an isolated tank so that e.g. a heat pump can run more efficient on it than on usually colder air or colder ground water?
In: Engineering
Most household water only starts at 120-140 degrees to begin with. By the time is passes through the pipe in the house, runs though the air, down the drain and back to some location to be stored its not that hot any more.
Furthermore its usually going to be mixed with cold water by the user.
There is no practical way to separate cold water going down the drain from hot,so it all ends up in the same place further reducing the temperature available for the pump.
Yes you could design some complex system of pipes that detect the temperature and shunt it one way or another but the more complex you make the system the less return you are getting out of it and the more likely it breaks down. Our current water disposal systems are simple and extremely cheap. Water flows downhill. Thats it. No pumps, no storage, no insulation to maintain temperature no diversions. It flows downhill all the way to the sewage treatment plant.
Your collected water system needs to divert the water somewhere, hold it, insulate it from losing more heat and then run it through a system to get the heat from it. Much more complex than todays drainage with much higher up front and maintenance costs. The end result is you gain no benefit from capturing barely if that heated water water for use in a heat pump.
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