by Carrie Kingsley
Life Buoy
by Carrie Kingsley
f I cut my shower time in half all week, can the kids run through the sprinklers this afternoon? Do you know how many gallons of water you use when you shower? Or how short your showers should be to offset half an hour of sprinklers on a hot summer day? I didn’ t. I used water all the time, every day, but didn’ t know anything more than my water
bill told me at the end of the month. Too little, too late.
The spark for Buoy came when I faced water rationing in the midst of California’ s drought, but I soon realized that my goal was more than just reducing my gallons used. Water use is an equation, there’ s give and take from month to month, season to season, and every household uses water differently. My goal became information. I had no idea where I was using the most water, or the least. Talking to other people, there were running themes: We only know how much water we’ re using when we look at our water bill. I don’ t know how much water I use when I shower. How much water goes to my lawn when I turn on the sprinklers? The people I talked to wanted information. So did I. So I built Buoy.
Buoy is a smart water device for your home. It’ s fairly small, just 12” long, and attaches to your main water line. Buoy uses tons of data science to interpret your water usage- everywhere you use water- both inside and outside the house.
The Buoy mobile app summarizes all this data into helpful charts to give you insight on your water usage. How much water does your family use for showers? Is your dishwasher really low-flow? How much water do you use indoors vs. outdoors? Is your lawn really using more water than everything else combined? Armed with this information, you can set a water budget to avoid surprise utility bills.
Buoy also detects leaks – big and small- and notifies you immediately. Whether you’ re at home or away, the Buoy alert lets you know when there’ s a problem, like a running toilet or a burst pipe. You can immediately shut off your home’ s water, right from the Buoy mobile app. This has been a lifesaver for several Buoy owners already, and we’ re excited to see how many more people it will help as we move from beta testing into wider distribution. Buoy has alerted homeowners to slow, contained leaks, like a running toilet that wastes 100 gallons of water per day. It’ s also saved huge amounts of time and money by alerting Buoy owners to sudden, potentially catastrophic leaks, like the hose that burst in a laundry room.
Data is the key to all of this, and we’ ve built a device that helps you gather and understand your own data. While we love the idea of saving water, Buoy isn’ t designed to limit you, or to shame you into using less water. Most people want to become more efficient with their water use, and Buoy’ s data helps you with that. But most of all, we want to put you in control, to let you use water in the places that are important to you. For some people, that’ s a swimming pool. For others, it’ s a lawn and a robust garden. So, even though we’ re from Santa Cruz, we aren’ t a crunchy, shame-you-for-using-water company. We like pools and hot tubs and lawns, and don’ t think you should have to replace your pool with a cactus garden unless that’ s your jam. Be responsible with your water, and you can maintain a water-filled lifestyle.
Find out more about us at www. buoy. ai www. facebook. com / buoylabs