Environmentally friendly pools

As summer starts to kick in, some of you are probably wishing you’d gotten organised last winter and had a swimming pool installed. Well, now is the time to act if you want to make sure you have somewhere cool to relax next summer.

Installing a pool is no longer simply a matter of choosing between kidney and rectangular and deciding where to put the cabana. In light of the current drought crisis, as well as global warming, environmental considerations should be at the forefront of all decision-making when you plan your new pool.

First things first: if you want to reduce your environmental footprint, installing a backyard swimming pool is not the way to do it. Apart from the obvious large quantities of water required to fill and maintain a pool there are other impacts such as the use of chemicals for cleaning and consumption of energy required to heat the water.

However, there are ways of reducing the impact on the environment and these are worth considering at the outset.

An obvious way to reduce water consumption is to install the smallest pool possible to meet your needs. Lap and plunge pools have become popular in recent years, especially in inner-city backyards where space is restricted. If it’s all about exercise, a lap pool may be all you need. If it’s just about keeping cool maybe a plunge pool will do the trick. Perhaps you would be satisfied simply with a spa. Of course if you have a house full of kids who need to expend energy, then this is unlikely to be a satisfactory compromise, but there are other ways to reduce your pool’s impact on the environment.

Pool covers are an excellent way of improving your pool’s environmental performance as they can reduce the overall evaporation of water by 75 percent. At times like these, when water restrictions are in force, it could be argued that the use of a pool cover should be mandatory. They also help to heat the water in the pool which reduces your reliance on artificial heating systems. Pool covers have other benefits of keeping the pool cleaner and reducing heat loss.

Other methods of improving your pool’s environmental performance include diverting rainwater from your roof to top up water levels and using solar panels to heat the water. You could also consider alternative means of treating the water in your pool such as salt chlorination, which has a more natural feel and can reduce eye irritation as well as hayfever and asthma.

Advice from a pool expert as well as your local council is essential at an early stage to ensure your pool will be a haven in summer without impacting unnecessarily on the environment.