Bulletin Board Magazine 2022 Volume 2

housing products, we recognize the need to advance smart home technology. We are refocusing on creating ways for consumers to conserve water through our newest LIXIL startup: Hydrific, a purpose-driven water management solutions company. By providing data insights that include actionable water saving tips and water-efficient product recommendations, we aim to provide the knowledge to create a smarter home. When I look at the future of smart homes, I see how the combination of purpose and technology can impact how our products ensure resource efficiency without compromising on performance. The next frontier of smart homes will include these three trends: Water is a precious resource but a limited one. Climate change is creating dangerous droughts, deadly flooding, and contamination of clean water across the globe. We need products and technologies in our kitchens and bathrooms that are designed to enable mindful consumption, rather than promote wasteful behavior and harmful exposure to contaminants. To address these issues in our homes, we need holistic, 360-degree water management systems. These systems should incorporate water-saving products with real-time data sharing to enable efficient lifestyles. For example, showers could incorporate a function that allocates how much water you use or limits how long your shower would last. This technology can show how much water you are saving per shower – which helps cut your water consumption when you have a house full of kids like mine is. Seeing the numbers right in front of you will make the value of water crystal clear. Increase environmental value of water

These filtration systems will become increasingly used in newer housing projects because consumers are increasingly demanding products that promote resource conservation.

Innovative sanitation solutions

When we think about sanitation, we believe that issues only exist outside of the US – this could not be further from the truth. Rapid urbanization and increasing water scarcity, combined with our crumbling infrastructure, make sanitation issues an immediate problem. We can’t ignore this problem anymore and must start looking for new solutions. The sanitation sector must transform through new technology and innovative problem solving. At LIXIL, we understand we can’t accomplish this alone. We currently collaborate with several partners in the Americas to tackle sanitation problems impacting over 2 million Americans. We are working with the public sector to better deliver innovative household solutions in water, sanitation, and hygiene. There is no one way to tackle these problems. New off-grid toilet systems can be installed anywhere, providing millions of people with improved, flexible, safe, and convenient alternatives for sanitation. LIXIL is already exploring these ideas through SATO, our social business that offers safe and affordable toilet systems to 9 million people around the world that don’t have access to indoor plumbing. There is a lot of room to reuse water that flows through our house each day. Smart Homes offer solutions to make “waste water” not so wasteful. Gray water – waste water from showers, sinks and washing machines – can be reused without compromising on sanitation. This use and reuse is called water circularity and is key for conserving our resources. Not every household activity requires fresh water. For example, toilets don’t need the clean water that comes from our municipalities to flush. Gray water that comes from a safe filtration system can replace the fresh water typically used when flushing. Circular Water in Future Homes

Let’s do this together

I look forward to the day when my own smart home helps my family use our valuable resources efficiently and conservatively. From personal experience, no manner of yelling to turn off the water can substitute for this type of practical technology. There is a lot of work that still needs to be done to bring these trends to life, but these systems will be here before you know it.

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