Copyright © Françoise Herrmann
Considering that the city of Paris was able to clean up the notoriously filthy River Seine, in time for the 2024 Olympics, after a 101-year ban on bathing in the river (O'Sullivan, 2024), you might be inspired to further reduce your energy footprint by conserving and recycling your own shower water down to 5 liters (approx 1.3 gal) of water per shower. The ILYA recirculating shower is a French, patented invention that has garnered multiple awards.
Most recently, the invention was awarded two, 2024 Concours Lépine medals (1), as well as the contest's overall second-place prize. The first Concours Lépine award was one of the contest's gold medals, awarded for the ILYA recirculating shower invention. The second Concours Lépine award was one of the contest's silver medals, awarded for the company‘s ILO sensor. An easy-to-install device that both measures and posts, in real-time, exactly how much water is used during a shower. Therefore, the company's ILO sensor is a device that was intended to motivate people to conserve more water, using the ILYA recirculating shower.
The ILYA recirculating shower was also granted the French patent FR3140385A1, titled Douche cyclique avec deux circuits indépendants chauffés (in English, Recirculating shower with two independent heated circuits), on April 5th, 2024. The invention was designed to resolve several problems of the prior art of shower water conservation. In particular, the invention addresses the problem of recycling household wastewater, termed “gray water” for showers.
Accordingly, the ILYA recirculating shower offers an elegant (see image), integrated solution for both regular (clean) and gray shower water, using a single shower head and controls, while also comprising all the added gray water equipment for straining, filtering, purifying, disinfecting, heating and draining the gray water system. The ILYA recirculating shower also offers the mandatory use of gray water separately from clean shower water per building codes, in such a way that when there is a power outage, or some other problem with the gray shower water electronic system, users can revert to using just the regular clean shower water system, until troubleshooting of the gray shower water system is complete. Finally, although both the regular clean shower water and gray water systems are separate, both systems are nonetheless coordinated for water temperatures to remain constant between both systems. In other words, when the user selects the regular clean shower water temperature for a shower, the gray shower water also flows at that same user-selected temperature. Thus, the ILYA recirculating shower is a system that was designed to truly enhance a water-conservation shower experience.
In a nutshell, the invention consists in turning on the regular (clean) shower water, at a user-selected temperature. In the open shower mode the water flows and is discharged without recycling. In the closed shower mode, the flowing water is collected as gray water that is filtered, disinfected and maintained at the same temperature as the clean water, for re-use during the shower (Alinaghi, 2024).
Below, the Figure 1 extracted from the French patent, together with the English version of the invention abstract, referencing the patent Figure 1.
The invention relates to a cyclic shower (10) comprising: two independent water circuits, a first circuit (70) called clean water (60) configured to be connected to the drinking water network, comprising a first outlet (80 ), and a second circuit (700), called gray water (600), comprising a second outlet (800) the second circuit (700), said clean water circuit (70) comprising a temperature adjustment system ( 90) allowing the user to provide a set temperature (91) of clean water (60), a pump (100) configured to reinject the gray water (600) into the gray water circuit (700), a water heater (400), a thermal control device (500) configured to extract the set temperature (91) and control the water heater (400), so that gray water (600) is a second outlet (700) at the set temperature (91) of the clean water (60). Figure for abstract: Figure 1. (Abstract FR3140385A1).
Note (1) Concours Lépine: The eponymous Lépine Innovation Contest has been held yearly, in Paris, since 1901.
References
Alinaghi, D. (May 13, 2024).Toulouse. Avec sa douche cyclique, Ilya remporte le 2e prix du concours Lépine 2024.
Concours Lépine
https://www.concours-lepine.com/
ILYA (website)
https://www.ilya-tech.fr/douche-cyclique-ilya
O’Sullivan, F. (July 23, 2024). How Paris cleaned up the Seine and where to swim.
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