Activity 2.2.1- My Daily Water Usage

Actual Water Use:

The water usage of my household during the last three months is as follows:

January 2024 - 5237 gallons

December 2023 - 5237 gallons

November 2023 - 3740 gallons

1. I calculated the sum of the last three months' water usage = 5237+5237+3740 = 14214 gallons

2. I averaged the number of gallons used across three bills = 14214/3  = 4738 gallons/month

3. I have 4 persons in my household. To get water usage per month by the number of people in my house,  I divided the average gallons used per month by the number of people in my house which is 4. 

The result is the water usage per person and per month = 4738/4 = 1184.5 = 1185 gallons/person/month

4. To get water usage per day for one person in my house, I divided the per person per month by 30 days.

The result is the per person per day amount of water use (on average) = 1185/30 =  39.5 = 40 gallons per day for one person

Water Calculators: 

1. Name of Calculator: Southwest Florida Water Management District

    URL: https://www.swfwmd.state.fl.us/conservation/water-use-calculator 

    Per Person Usage:  66 gallons per day per person

2. Name of Calculator: Smart Watermark (Australian)

     URL: https://smartwatermark.org/watercalculator/aus/#results 

     Per Person Usage: 134.8L= 35.610 US liquid gallons = 36 gallons per day per person 

Summary of My Water Use Study:

After reviewing my household's last three water bills, I was surprised that we used the same amount of water in January as in December which is 5237 gallons according to SAWS's actual utility bills, and there is a big difference between the usage of November and December 2023. According to SAWS, our water usage was higher than my neighborhood, and SAWS Residential average water usage. Water used in excess may be attributed to outdoor water application. Another reason that might connect to excess use is we have installed a water softener and a filter that enables the tap water safe to drink. Because of that, we would be using more water from the tap instead of buying Ozarka bottles or gallons. Gardening also consumes a lot of water. Even though we don't use a lawn water system, we use a regular garden hose to water the plants which is another outdoor water application.

When I used Southwest Florida Water Management's calculator, it asked a large set of questions to track every water use we make in indoor and outdoor environments. As a result, the final calculation for per-person usage per day showed 66 gallons. However, Smart Watermark asked fewer questions compared to the Southwest Florida Water calculator and that is why the per-person usage per day is 36 gallons which is lower than our actual water usage in San Antonio.  

There are several ways we can save water and also save on water utility bills. If we avoid washing our cars at our house's driveway and wash them on a traditional car wash, we will save a lot of water and it will impact the bill as well. Some other ways to reduce water usage are as follows: 

1. Avoid long showers,

 2. When dishwashing by hand, don't leave the faucet on for too long, 

3. Reducing the amount of laundry per day, and

4. Installing low-flow filters in the faucets.

After following these steps, we will not only reduce water wastage in our household but also save significantly on bills. 

Reference                                                  

San Antonio Water System(SAWS). Homepage https://www.saws.org/ConnectH2O/