What steps can we take to decrease our water consumption?

Question

In Australia and all over the world, water is becoming scarce. Droughts have led to water restrictions in the cities as well as in agriculture and manufacturing. So, I want to know what you think are the best and most innovative ways to decrease water consumption?

I am the real Jay-Z and you can check out what I have been getting up to on water conservation in the Yahoo!7 Answers Team blog - http://au.blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-txN._0woRKfpYuTJw9rObY.WmgiUW5xm?p=554

Answer 1

Hi Jay-Z. It is great that you are using your fame to push this important topic. These are some simple steps that people can take to decrease their use of water -

Kitchen and laundry:
-Only use the dishwasher and washing machine when they are full. Use the sink when you have a small number of dishes to wash.
-When buying a dishwasher or washing machine make sure it’s a water-saver by looking for the ‘AAA’ rating.
-Install tap aerators to reduce water flow.
-Use the sud-saver option when doing the laundry.

Bathroom:
-Fix toilet leaks. (Tip - add food colouring to the cistern water and let it sit for 15 minutes; if it appears in the toilet bowl without flushing you’ve got a leak).
-Don’t leave the tap running when you brush your teeth.
-Keep your showers short, use a timer. A shower uses 10 to 20 litres of water a minute.
-Install water saving shower heads and dual flush toilets.
-Insulate your water heater and hot water pipes so you waste less water while waiting for the hot water to flow.
-When building a new house place the hot water service as close as possible to the wet areas (i.e. bathroom, laundry etc).

Garden:
-Give the garden a good soak two or three times a week to encourage deep root growth. This is more efficient that a light watering every day.
-Water during the coolest time of the day to avoid wasting water through evaporation.
-Install drip irrigation for flowers and shrubs.
-Mulch and compost around plants to reduce evaporation and improve water holding capacity.
-Select natives and other plants which require less water.
-If you don’t have a timer on your hose, use the oven timer to remind you to turn the tap off.
-Fix leaky hoses and hose connections.
-Recycle water for fountains and water ornaments.
-Use automatic shot-off nozzles on your hoses.
-Avoid using sprinklers in hot or windy conditions – water in cool, calm conditions in the morning or evening.

Around the home:
-Check your home’s water meter for system leaks. To test, turn off all taps and water-using appliances, read the meter, then wait 30 minutes and read it again. If the dial has moved, you may have a leak in the toilet or water pipe.
-Sweep driveways, footpaths and steps instead of hosing them down.
-Install a rainwater tank with a pumping system and plumb it to your house
-Use a bucket to wash the car.

Swimming pools:
-Use a cover on your pool to reduce evaporation.
-Check your pool and its pipe work regularly and repair any leaks.
-Consider buying a pool filter that uses less water during filter cleaning.

Install a Rainwater Tank:
For information on selection and installation of rainwater tanks systems see the Australian Greenhouse Office site for the brochure on ‘ Your Home Guide’.

Water saving appliances
Water-using appliances are rated from A to AAAAA, the more ‘A’s the more water efficient the product. By purchasing products which are more water efficient, not only will you save water and money, you will use less energy and therefore reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Answer 2

Hi Jay, good question and most of the answers have been given already. I will have a go for you:

I think we could save alot of water if

- people were made conscious of the importance of water, maybe through a world wide campaign (this would encourage a more responsible attitude).
- people would not spray their leaves and garden debris away with the water hose! What happened to the rake and brush?
- people as soon as there is a heat-wave, would not spray their gardens with thousands of liters of valuable water. Plants can survive with surprisingly little water! I am not saying let the plants die, but use common sense!
- the government would impose a limit of water on each household per day, depending upon the size of the family. (This would not be a very popular, but an effective remedy!). But it would be quite costly, fitting households and companies with massive water consumption, with meters etc!
- the government made new investments regarding the recycling and purification of water. (Costly, but salt water can be desalinated). Investments in general for a more efficient water production. Maybe some more research regarding river estuaries. Why does the salt sea water change to fresh water as the river proceeds further inland?
- maybe a restriction on the use of dish-washing machines or washing machines. Search for new technoligical breakthroughs or more efficient software, to regulate the amount of water being used. (ie: dishwashers should be fitted with a sensor that stops the machine washing, when the machine is not full enough).
- it would be possible to collect the water from the melting poles and glaciers, before it all melts into the sea..just an idea!
- stop the over-production of goods that are water intensive during their production.
- the government would charge more for the water we use (probably this idea will not be very popular, but the world's water reserves are more important than popularity)!
- the companies producing toxic wastes, were not allowed to let the wastes run into the waterways. This decreases the amount of water available for the consumers and the industries too, not to talk about the damage to the environment!
- every household could collect rainwater to spray around the garden during dry spells!
-everybody would pull on the same string, show solidarity and work together for us all. If we do not, we can only blame ourselves.

Hope this gives a few ideas..All the best!

Answer 3

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Answer 4

I'll leave it to the experts to provide "innovative ways to decrease water consumption," but I will make two points.

Point one: It's really a question of population.

I think your question has a subtle phrasing error: water is not becoming scarce. There is just a certain available amount of fresh water. Sure there are variations do to droughts etc, but the real problem is just that the amount of fresh water on planet Earth is finite.

So consider this: imagine we figure out how to reduce the water consumption per person by half. Great. But guess what - the population is increasing. So all that you've really done is to postpone the real problem. Once the population doubles, you will be in exactly the same situation. So you figure out new ways to conserve water - but if you don't stop population growth, you will be eventually in the same situation, yet again.

Point 2: we already know how to conserve water.

Trouble is, most people don't care, and it is expensive to corporations to do it, so nobody does it.

So properly stated, the question is: how do we make conserving water popular among individuals and corporations?

Or even better: How do we control population?

As regards those questions, I have no idea.

Answer 5

Why not just use the water from the ocean. Just filter out the salt and then filter it again for drinking and move it to wherever it needs to be moved. Expensive yes, but it seems that's what the world is coming to. So why not find the cheapest method to do that now? As for decreasing water consumption, I think it impossible (at least in America, I know you said Australia) because the culture just doesn't teach conservation. Given that, perhaps we should teach the children to be more responsible, and put more money into the educational system. Honestly, we have fat stupid kids being pumped out of school these days. Why is America wasting all this money? We pay upwards of 250 Billion dollars per year in mere interest fees from money we've borrowed from other countries. That's more interest fees than what gets put into the educational system. Anyways, enough about American. Best and most innovative? I don't think there needs to be an innovative way, just any way, since we aren't doing much in the first place anyways.

Answer 6

Those who answer "desalinization" are on the right path. Humans will not stop using less water, but instead and most assuredly, humans will use more and more and more water. The Earth is 70% covered in this most abundant resource. Since humans are 70% water we need, want and will always demand water.
Saving water is not necessary as water comes to use naturally and free of charge. Austrailia, as you mention, is surrounded by water, so the only ones thinking Austrialia has drought problems then they're thinking very shallow.

Kudos to you for bringing this important topic to the forefront. However, while I have not followed your team activities, I do know that using less water is the wrong path, and completely out of the question. We are surrounded by water. We can see it from the shoreline. We can see it on the mountain tops. We can go to America's freezer and see huge ice cubes slowly melting while other portions freeze again, both processes sustaining our water flow.
Years ago Americans were quite proficient at coverting sea-water to drinking water. Derelict desalinization plants sit all over our coastlines as grim reminders to a society taken with greed.

As a new generation coming forward you should strive to first look beyond the common deception, and then to use the natural resourses freely given upon this planet. Use them to the very best of your ability. Doing so you will soon find how perfectly sensible it really is. Think about this simple fact: the more water we use, the less fuel oil and electricity we use, and the less global polution and evironmental damage we contribute. The Earth will never run short of water. Never. It won't matter how much we use because there will always, always be more than that.

Answer 7

An experiment: take a teaspoon of water and pour it into a full swimming pool and try to measure the difference. This is what efforts to conserve water by doing less laundry, shorter showers, not watering our lawns, etc., will accomplish. The real culprits are industry, farms and the population growth that lower the water table in a populated area. Water is not becoming scarce at all -- it's everywhere. The problem is we tend to use ALL the available water in the area where we reside. It seems more logical to increase water supply vs decrease water consumption. Desalinization of sea water appears to be the answer staring us in the face. The technology to do this is here today, it is a proven process and can, with improved science, be economical. You'll never convince me that we could not built and operate pipelines that would move enough water to fill an inland ocean if we put our minds to it. We never blink at the thought of constructing super highways, bridges or railways across mountains, caynons, rivers or even UNDER the English channel yet we stand and scratch our heads wondering if the public will accept a law requiring a daily quota on precious drinking water. Less scratching, more construction.

Answer 8

Canada Europe and South America should have a limited use of water each day and if it exceeds the amount the water will shutdown until the next day. People today are taking for granted of what they have instead of what the world has. The world has a limit of water and most of it is being wasted for big appliances like dishwasher and washing machine. I also believe everyone should have sensors for there tap so liters of water aren't being wasted. Here in North America you don't really think about you re water consumption an average person probably wastes more water a day then a small city in Africa drinks or washes there clothes in.So the world really has to act up now before there could be a drought not only in Africa or Australia but in the whole world.

Answer 9

Wow... that's wondeful, I can see that tou are using your fame to try and help convince people to stop the water consumption, and I guess that will spark some action... well for starters, we can try and do the more simpler stuff, take shorter showers such as at LEAST 5-10 minute showers, not turn the water on while brushing your teeth (that's an oldie) or grill haha, don't fill the tub to the top of the bathtub, only at a respectable level, considering the fact that if we continue to pollute the water there is going to be less and less water because (chances are) that we will continue to do so until there is no more clean, unpolluted, healthy water and then sadly, we will most likely "pass" away from dehydration... So, we can try to create less waste, by perhaps recycling paper and plastic and such and such, (this is somewhat off topic but, those plastic things that hold sodas or beers together??? If people would please cut those into smaller pieces when throwing them away or buy cardboard boxes and recycle them afterwards because, seagulls and basically any other bird, mistake those "things" for food so when they swoop down to the beach where sadly of course there is pollution and left over food, they get their heads caught in it and then can't eat and pass away or choke to their sad death :( ) Well anyways, sorry about that, back to your question, we could also (in a sense of community work and all) go to beaches and pick up all trash there, if people (specifically a community or anything) do this at least once a month, we could certainly cut down on the pollution we create on the beach, and the truth is, no matter how much signs we put saying, "please recycle" or "please don't litter", there are going to be some people who it doesn't "apply" to because they are too "clean" or "cool" or something, to do it. Well, I know you may have already known this, but it is an effective way to help down on our water consumption. So, that being said, good luck, but one more way to help could actually be to use your fame and well create a "Jay-Z Water Preservation Fund". Wear a suit and make a speech, write a rap or song, and then perform it for the world to hear, I dunno like maybe "Every day.... I wake up and see the world... Every day, I wanna say "Just stop..... We need to save all that water..." or something LOL, wow that was horrible wasn't it? Well, anyways... You should understand what i'm saying though... right??? Well yeah, but anyway, hope this helped and once good luck!!!!

P.S. I love your raps, they're real good, but (sorry for this but) why do you always perform with Beyonce??? Is it becuase you guys work great together??? You're good friends??? Something BEYOND friends??? Becuase your boss says so??? Well, I don't know, ok well good luck!

Answer 10

Water today is being wasted A LOT. In my opinion every body in the U.S Canada Europe and South America should have a limited use of water each day and if it exceeds the amount the water will shutdown until the next day. People today are taking for granted of what they have instead of what the world has. The world has a limit of water and most of it is being wasted for big appliances like dishwasher and washing machine. I also believe everyone should have sensors for there tap so liters of water aren't being wasted. Here in North America you don't really think about you re water consumption an average person probably wastes more water a day then a small city in Africa drinks or washes there clothes in.So the world really has to act up now before there could be a drought not only in Africa or Australia but in the whole world.

Answer 11

I'm a plumber. People like me are responsible for the most water-wasting appliances ever to be invented. Recenty (within the last ten years) there has been a serious push to come up with plumbing fixtures that use less water. The first generation of low-consumption toilets was a total failure. Less water meant they didn't flush well and people would end up flushing several times, so there was actually MORE water used. Later designs included an air-pressure tank to give the small amount of water more force. These work well. I think we could go one step further and supply houses with raw water for toilets in addition to the purified water we use for washing and drinking, but it would have to be an entirely separate system.
Another major offender is watering lawns too much. If you can enjoy your yard without a big patch of green carpet, it saves a lot of water. If you really MUST have a lawn, don't water it more than a couple of hours a week.
Dripping faucets also waste a lot of water. What looks like a tiny drip- allowed to continue 24 hours a day 7 days a week really adds up to a lot of water down the drain.
And only full loads in the clothes- or dish-washer.
And only cry if you really need to. And never drink lite beer.