What Can We Do to Reduce Water Usage

How much water do you employ every solar day?  The respond might surprise you.

A paper released online concluding week in the periodical Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concluded that Americans significantly underestimate their h2o use. Curious how my friends and family unit would fare, I reached out via social media and posed the simple question, "how much water do you lot use each day?"  The results in my quick survey ranged to from 2 gallons to 300 gallons, merely the most common estimate was x to 15 gallons per twenty-four hours.  In reality, Americans use closer to 90 gallons of water a day.  To put things in perspective, a 10-infinitesimal shower with an EPA WaterSense labeled loftier efficiency showerhead consumes 22 gallons, while a 20 minute shower with an older, high flow showerhead could be every bit much as 100 gallons.  Terminal month, Governor Brown declared a state of emergency and called on all Californians to conserve water in every fashion possible.  Knowing how much water y'all utilize, and how and where you utilize it, are important offset steps in determining the almost effective ways you tin can save water in your home and concern.

Given the severity and far-reaching impacts of our dwindling h2o supplies on cities, farms, native fisheries and the environment, you lot have to wonder - why are we still watering our lawns and flushing our toilets with increasingly scarce and expensive beverage water?  When it rains, why do we allow all that water menstruum to a storm drain and so out to the nearest river or ocean?  The truth is…we waste a lot of h2o.  The practiced news is that it means in that location are significant opportunities to use h2o more efficiently and increase our local h2o supplies.  Everyone must practise his or her part to create a drought resilient California; we demand forwards-looking commitment and investment by our leaders, and we need sensation and thoughtfulness on behalf of all individuals throughout the state.

So what are some smart choices communities tin can make to ameliorate set for an uncertain time to come? Let's accept the familiar phrase "reduce, reuse, recycle" and apply that to our water supplies. For our communities to be resilient and fix for the worst effects of climatic change, we demand to rethink how we use, and reuse, h2o and wastewater so that we tin make the most of our most essential resource.

• We can reduce our h2o consumption by making modest changes to our daily activities such as not watering our lawns equally often and taking shorter showers, and we can replace inefficient products in our homes like clothes washers, toilets, faucets and showerheads.
• We can reuse water in our homes and businesses to the extent possible. One of the easiest and safest awarding of this concept is the onsite utilise of graywater and captured rainwater, sources suitable for a number of not-potable uses, such as landscape irrigation and toilet flushing, that otherwise would be discarded as waste.
• Nosotros can recycle our wastewater, purifying it so that it tin be used to recharge groundwater supplies and supersede drink water for non-potable applications, most commonly large-scale landscape irrigation.

Hither are some easy tips for incorporating "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" into your daily activities to help you lot heed the Governor'southward call to save water and improve the sustainability and hereafter drought resilience of our communities.

REDUCE

TIP – Take advantage of the rebates and incentives offered by your local h2o supplier!  It can be as easy as checking their website.  Some common programs yous might observe include:

• Free faucet aerators and/or loftier efficiency showerheads.
• Rebates on high efficiency toilets and clothes washers.
• "Cash for grass" – a plan where water suppliers pay customers to replace thirsty lawns with California friendly gardens.
• Directly installation or rebates for laundry-to-landscape graywater systems.
• Rebates on rain barrels – collect the rain that falls on your roof & save information technology for a sunny day!

TIP - Cheque for leaks.  Household leaks account for well-nigh 1 trillion gallons of wasted water every year!  Does your toilet run all night?  You could be wasting over 100 gallons per day.  Does your faucet or showerhead drip later on you turn it off?   A leaky faucet that drips at the rate of one drip per 2nd tin can waste more than than three,000 gallons per year. That'south the amount of water needed to take more 180 showers!  To test your toilet, merely add some nutrient coloring to the tank and meet if information technology appears in the bowl.  If it does, you probably need to supplant the flapper in your tank – it's a quick and cheap fix that tin salve hundreds of gallons of water.

TIP – Supplant your l awn with a beautiful, drought-resistant landscape.

Some water suppliers will actually pay you to remove your lawn, upwards to $three/square pes of removed turf! Don't worry, this doesn't mean replacing your lush grass with cacti and a stone garden; check out these amazing drought-tolerant gardens. Be certain to check to see if your local water supplier offers a "lawn-to-landscape" or "greenbacks-for-grass" program.

Credit: Enviroscape LA

Credit: EPA.gov, Perla Arquieta

Credit: EPA.gov, Susie Dowd Markarian

TIP - Watch your foodprint. Consider your personal water footprint when you make a purchase, especially nutrient grown in California.  Did you know that it takes 1,850 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of beef, chicken is nigh one-tertiary of that at 519 gallons per pound, while vegetables are simply 39 gallons per pound?  –Be mindful of your foodprint and eat less, better quality meat - past skipping the burger or carne asada tacos just 1 day a week, you tin can reduce your personal h2o footprint by up to 25,000 gallons of water per year!  Check out the infographic below and see how much water is used to produce other normally purchased items.

REUSE

TIP  – Get greywater. Install a "laundry-to-landscape" greywater irrigation system that uses water from your clothes washer to irrigate the plants in your yard.  For those DIY folks, this is something yous can easily do yourself and does not crave any amending of your existing plumbing – cheque out San Francisco's Greywater Manual for great footstep-by-step instructions.  The City of Long Beach installed 36 laundry-to-mural systems for free equally part of a pilot program, cheque with your water supplier to meet if they take whatsoever incentive programs for greywater irrigation systems.

Credit: Elayne Sears, Female parent Earth News

RECYCLE

TIP - Rather than washing your motorcar at abode, get to a car wash that recycles its water!

If these tips yet haven't quenched your want to reduce your water consumption, y'all can find a few more tricks on this list of 9 things y'all tin do at abode to aid your customs be as water efficient as possible.

"If you fail to plan, y'all are planning to fail" – Benjamin Franklin

Reducing our water footprint isn't merely virtually coping with this drought.  Climate alter is expected to bring more frequent and intense droughts, and the population of California is standing to grow.  By 2050, the population of California is projected to exceed 50 million people; by 2060 we will have added more people than currently live in Pennsylvania. Potable h2o is our well-nigh precious resource, and here in California we are significantly dependent on sources like the frail San Joaquin Delta and the oversubscribed Colorado River.  We must notice new ways to meet the demands of a growing population facing a hereafter of increasingly limited sources of water. Planning for time to come water shortages and making smart choices is the but fashion to ensure adequate supplies to meet all our needs while protecting the environment.

longwhan1977.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.nrdc.org/experts/tracy-quinn/how-can-you-reduce-your-water-footprint

Share this post