A New Dishwasher

My new dishwasher – sadly not installed yet

We have been living with our lovely new kitchen for a month or two now, but we have been a bit slow to buy our new appliances. It’s been a bit daft really as some of them will save me time like our new dishwasher. I have been without a dishwasher (one that works at least) for about 5 years I think. The one we had at the old house broke and we never got around to getting a new one. I think we felt a bit let down by it because whilst it was out of guarantee, it was still fairly new. We left it in place and it was handy to have it there when we were having people round to view the house when we were selling because it filled a gap and I could always hide some stuff inside it. When we moved we put it outside for the scrap men to collect. Then at the current house the dishwasher was left behind ‘for us’. We could not get it to work. It didn’t seem to be plumbed in properly and the pipework in that area was a nightmare. We left it in place (seeing a pattern here?) and put it out for the scrap man when we redid the kitchen. So at last we have got a new one and we have proper plumbing in place for it. Yay!

The change from hand washing up to machine washing up has made me think about saving energy. We have picked out an energy-efficient machine, but it’s been good to read up about things like energy-efficient cycles.  It seems a bit bizarre, but using an eco or auto dishwasher cycle could use less energy than short cycles, so it’s worth reading the manual to find out a bit more.  As we have a water meter, saving water is a concern too.  Could using a dishwasher really use less water than washing by hand?  I’ve been using this water saving tool to find out a bit more.  Apparently, my new dishwasher could save me up to 126 litres of water a week, which is a financial saving as well as being better for the environment.