Washing away the water

The average UK household uses roughly 40 pints of water a day using washing machines, this figure has risen sharply over the last few years, since 1990 washing machine usage has gone up by a massive 23% due to the fact that the average household now washes their clothes on average 4 times a week compared to  15 years ago when it was just 3. Throughout the country this equals around 800 million pints of water which would fill 145 sizes Olympic swimming pools.
In the past many people used commercial laundry equipment in laundrettes to wash their clothes but as washing machines have got significantly cheaper this area has now declined.

The goverment has said that it would like to decrease water usage by by the year 2010 but this seems unlikely as it stands
seem like it will be met.
But now there appears to be a way that this could all change. Dubbed Xeros it is already being compared to the Dyson bagless hover which changed the whole cleaning industry in the mid 90's.
The machine uses only 2% of the water conventional large washing machines use which makes it the first virtually waterless washing machine.
The testers at the University of leeds where this technology has been developed claim it could be ready by late 2009.
The way it works is by taking thousands of small chips which are made of plastic, they absorb the dirt then help remove it. Roughly 20 kilos are loaded to each wash with a cup of water, the water is then heated to dissolve the dirt then the chips are used to absorb the dirt.
The company behind the product hope this will change the way we wash our clothes and could not only save money but also the environment, it is also hope this technology could be used in commercial dishwashers as well as many other water using household items