Want to stop wasting water in your restaurant kitchen? Luckily, saving water is simpler than you may think.

Learning to conserve water is a matter of practicing good energy management. By following our simple checklist, you can significantly increase your energy efficiency without affecting your customers.

Conserving water is not only better for your kitchen and your budget, allowing you to run a tighter and more cost-effective operation, but most of these energy management tips will help the environment as well.

Here are our top water saving tips:

  1. Don’t use running water to melt ice in the sink. While it may seem like a time-saver, this technique is literally just water down the drain.
  2. Adjust the settings on your ice machines on a regular basis so that you only produce the ice you need. This is an excellent way to conserve water.
  3. Make sure your spray nozzles are low-volume sprayers. High-volume nozzles can spray as much as 4.5 gallons of water per minute. The lower-volume nozzles only use 2.0 gallons per minute—which adds up to huge energy savings. (Take a look at how you can get a free low-volume pre-rinse sprayer.)
  4. Don’t use running water to pre-soak your dirty dishes and utensils; use a basin instead.
  5. Only run the dishwasher when it’s fully loaded.
  6. Practice “intelligent loading” in the dishwasher to up your energy efficiency. Make sure that plates and utensils are on the bottom shelf, while cups, saucers, bowls, glasses and other potential water traps are loaded on the top shelf, or in a position where gravity will naturally pull the water down. Placing these objects on the bottom shelf blocks water from effectively cleaning the other items in the dishwasher, and necessitates a second run where one will do.
  7. Consider a tankless hot water heater. These provide automatic hot water, so you’re not wasting energy as you wait for water to get hot enough to use. (Plus, you can get $150 off a tankless hot water heater with one of our reabtes.)

Do you have any tips for conserving water? Leave them in the comments.

Image credit: emrank