Water Scarcity

[Raekwon]

#conservewater2012

[Clarkey]

It's plentiful and cheap. When it ceases being cheap people will adjust. Same thing with gasoline. Why live like a martyr now? Doesn't mean a guy needs to leave the taps running but come on, flushing the toilet with a jug filled with bathwater?

[something]

The hydrologic cycle has long been quoted as a natural defence to our water usage. I think the main point here though is that the hydrologic cycle may not operate at a fast enough rate that it restores balance to the water based environments we are pulling our water from.

I think my opinion stems from one of general conservation. Turn off lights you don't need, don't drive somewhere you could walk or bike within a reasonable time frame. Don't consume without regard to the inputs is what I am getting at here.

Excess water usage does not carry much stigma to it as I have seen. I find this interesting. Consider someone who consumes too much food - they become overweight and observe outward signs of there intemperance. In our society, intemperance in almost any form has been attached with stigma. However, you don't walk around with your most recent water bill attached to your forehead. Hence, we are not reminded or prompted to change our water usage if it is excessive or unreasonable.

Perhaps my stance is a unique one, but it is certainly not limited to water.

I wonder if in North America, we are more inclined to regard water as an economic resource versus a natural resource. By this, I mean that we are dissociated from water's natural source, and tend to contemplate our usage within an economic context/paradigm.

Incentives to cut back on use are thus relegated to cost-reducing behaviour. Rather than having a general respect for the substance's origins, we primarily consider how it affects our utilities bill. This brings me back to what I had said earlier, in which Europe seems to differ from North America in that European culture has for much longer been faced with the reality of resource scarcity, and as such, European culture has incorporated reverent attitude towards resources and temperance in their use.

The colonisation of NA, otherwise, has been largely based on the drive for resource expansion. And resources is what they got. NA has since maintained a much lower population density and, incidentally, a much higher ratio of resources to population. I wonder how much this reality has impacted the culture of NA so that there isn't the same level of perspective of resource use.

[something]

Originally Posted by Clarkey

It's plentiful and cheap. When it ceases being cheap people will adjust. Same thing with gasoline. Why live like a martyr now? Doesn't mean a guy needs to leave the taps running but come on, flushing the toilet with a jug filled with bathwater?

I think it is something to be appreciated. In my mind, it is a proactive attitude to a problem that may feasibly become real in the next few decades.

As I stated in my previous post, I think it is more so a general attitude of temperance than one of immediate concern to newly observed problems.

If we have the capacity to be prescient, why not exercise that? Why not demonstrate a respect for the land, future generations, and live in a sustainable manner?

Maybe he takes it too far, but when we consider the average toilet flushes with around 20 litres - to flush everytime we visit the bathroom becomes a bit wasteful IMO. There are some basic strategies to reduce water usage and I was hoping to have the board share any of the ones they use/developed.

[something]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

With the quality of the wastewater system in Calgary, I don't really see the point of going too far in an effort to use less water. The water that goes down the drain end up back in the river cleaner than when it got taken out of the river.

Not that I don't try to conserve water, it just seems that, at least here, efforts can be more productive elsewhere.

I believe so too. There are parts of the world where water consumption is a significantly more pressing issue than it is here in Calgary.

Still, it doesn't take too much effort to start a thread online and consider/share some basic methods to save on water use.

[something]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

The real solution people don't have the guts to mention is that we can all piss in the sink or into bottles and then fertilize our lawns instead of wasting 5 litres of water per flush even if you re-use the bowl several times before you do it.

I hadn't considered that yet!

Thanks!

I'll come over and fertilize your lawn as a demonstration of my gratitude for this valuable technique!!!

[squiggs96]

Originally Posted by something

2. This might be gross to some, but I won't flush urine. I find it wasteful to flush 20 litres of water just so the toilet bowl isn't off-yellow. There is no odour produced, and with the lid down, you wouldn't ever notice.


4. This isn't me, but my brother had a unique strategy (to the chagrin of his girlfriend) where he would shower with the drain plugged and use the leftover water and a bucket to flush the toilet. Something I would adopt in a hurry if my roommate agreed to it.

#2 How big is your toilet? 20 litres seems about 5 times bigger than it needs to be. If your tank is that big fill some 2L pop bottles with the water in the back of the toilet and leave them in there. Each flush will be less.

#4 That's disgusting.

A simple things I do is turn off the water when I'm brushing my teeth. From the time I was a kid until a few years ago I would let the water run while I was brushing. When someone pointed out how much water I was wasting it made sense. I also felt dumb for not figuring this out on my own.

[Mass_nerder]

Ultimately I would love to see grey water systems as a requirement in all new houses...a grey water system in every house could make a significant difference in water usage without anyone doing anything to amend their practices.

[something]

Originally Posted by squiggs96

#2 How big is your toilet? 20 litres seems about 5 times bigger than it needs to be. If your tank is that big fill some 2L pop bottles with the water in the back of the toilet and leave them in there. Each flush will be less.

#4 That's disgusting.

A simple things I do is turn off the water when I'm brushing my teeth. From the time I was a kid until a few years ago I would let the water run while I was brushing. When someone pointed out how much water I was wasting it made sense. I also felt dumb for not figuring this out on my own.

His strategy isn't so disgusting as you might think.

it actually works quite well, the flushing mechanism is gravity induced - pouring water in manually is virtually no different that letting it flow into the bowl from the tank. it just replaces the source from one that would otherwise be discarded.

[something]

Originally Posted by Mass_nerder

Ultimately I would love to see grey water systems as a requirement in all new houses...a grey water system in every house could make a significant difference in water usage without anyone doing anything to amend their practices.

I have never heard of this, is it commercially available?

[photon]

Originally Posted by starseed

It would generate air pollution, but it would still seem to be the best option right now.

Compared to what though? Hard to evaluate without a context, I'm sure there are some situations where it might be the best option, I'm just not convinced that as it scaled up that it would be the best option.

Heck it might be better to have a large facility that burns dung more clean and efficiently.

Originally Posted by starseed

However, as our ability to capture solar energy increases, maybe we could further enhance the device.

Definitely, solar powered anything is better since the energy comes for free. Or mostly free, the energy creating the solar gathering device must be accounted for too.

Originally Posted by starseed

The UN believes that another factor that deteriorates the health of the poorest in developing countries (outside of access to clean water), is the use of burning wood in an enclosed space to cook food.

For sure, as I mentioned respiratory illnesses are a huge issue for kids in India.

Originally Posted by starseed

The slingshot device could also be used to solve that problem by becoming a source of electricity. Less time spent gathering fuel and clean water means more time spent increasing their quality of life.

The only problem here is you still have to burn something to generate that electricity, and burning a log to generate electricity to cook food is going to be far less efficient than burning the log and cooking with that directly.. have to be careful that that doesn't result in an increase of burning of dung and wood and such.

Don't get me wrong I'm a fan of good solutions to problems, but I'm always skeptical of anything that sounds like a silver bullet.

Originally Posted by squiggs96

#4 That's disgusting.

A guy I used to know a long time ago had a business where his invention was a unit you put in your basement to, in effect, do this.

Water from some sources (laundry, maybe the shower, I can't remember all of them), was fed into a unit where it was roughly filtered and exposed to UV and basically processed to make it less icky (safe), then fed back into the toilets so that flushing used "dirty" water anyway.

[To Be Quite Honest]

What about getting a dual flush conversion kit for your American Standard?

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Mass_nerder

Ultimately I would love to see grey water systems as a requirement in all new houses...a grey water system in every house could make a significant difference in water usage without anyone doing anything to amend their practices.

Everybody just needs their own small-scale water processing/recycling facilities at home before it hits the sewage system to alleviate the burden...and solar power on our roofs.

Come on Harper government, increase the tax credits for installing eco-technologies in residential homes...

[GreenLantern]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

Everybody just needs their own small-scale water processing/recycling facilities at home before it hits the sewage system to alleviate the burden...and solar power on our roofs.

Come on Harper government, increase the tax credits for installing eco-technologies in residential homes...

Hahaha.. best thing I have read in a while.

The same guy that is cutting EC's roster wave by wave isn't even going to pretend he cares.

[Vansmack]

Water is becoming a bigger and bigger issue. Fresh water delivery has recently increased as much as 50% to some of the wellsites I manage. However, in a bind, technology does exist to remove salt from sea water. A number of sailboats I have been on use this during long hauls where fresh water isn't easily acquired.

[macker]

Although water covers about 70% of the planets surface, less than 1% of it is available for human use. Of the surface water that is available, the lions share is in the Great Lakes and is unavailable to coastal regions. Upscale living, suburban life, is water intensive. Lawns, landscaping, swimming pools, and jucuzzis can easily use thousands of gallons. The bigger the house and lot the more water-intensive amenities it has, the more water the owner uses.

Some 2 billion people on the planet don't have access to fresh water, and some of the most pronounced problems are in places like China, where industrialization is consuming vast quantities that can't be replaced. The U.S. population alone is expected to grow by another 129 million people by 2050. Where will the water come from? Mother nature isn't making more bodies of fresh water.


Also regarding electricity, if demand continues electricity consumption in the U.S. will double in 26 years. The electricity grid capacity isn't sufficient and there is likely to be a gap of about 81,000 megawatts by 2015.


Sources : ? Aqua Shock or The Cul-De-Sac Syndrome? One of the two

[Mass_nerder]

Originally Posted by something

I have never heard of this, is it commercially available?

It's expensive, but available...it basically requires you to have an entire separate plumbing system for the grey water, a large cistern, and filtering equipment.
It's not just one method though...
For example, you could have a green roof and pipe the excess water into the grey water system, or connect your weeping system to a grey water system. I think typically though, people just use a grey water system to collect water used in sinks, showers, tubs (not toilets, that's black water), filter and treat it, and use the treated water to flush toilets, or water gardens/lawns etc...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greywater

[GP_Matt]

Grey Water seems like a good idea albeit expensive. Another alternative would be to have two water lines running into the house, one for drinking water and the other for everything else. It seems wrong that we put so many resources towards purifying water that we then water the grass with or wash our filth away with. I would be surprised if we ingest 1% of the water that comes into the house. A third idea would be to degrade the water coming into the house and have the drinking water delivered.
I still stand though that this will never happen when water is cheap enough to be considered free.

[moncton golden flames]

Originally Posted by Mass_nerder

It's expensive, but available...it basically requires you to have an entire separate plumbing system for the grey water, a large cistern, and filtering equipment.
It's not just one method though...
For example, you could have a green roof and pipe the excess water into the grey water system, or connect your weeping system to a grey water system. I think typically though, people just use a grey water system to collect water used in sinks, showers, tubs (not toilets, that's black water), filter and treat it, and use the treated water to flush toilets, or water gardens/lawns etc...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greywater

a friend of mine filters his laundry grey water thru a series of small ponds in his yard, which eventually dumps into his garden beds.

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

Not that I don't try to conserve water, it just seems that, at least here, efforts can be more productive elsewhere.

With cleaner and more ample power production capabilities, water conservation is 100% unnecessary, since the oceans are full of it.

Like all forms of conservation (water, oil, electricity, etc), I firmly believe that the only way forward as a planet is through increased consumption - we need to drive demand high enough that we don't ween ourselves off of existing means of power production via decreased demand, but instead force ourselves to push and adopt mass energy production techniques to feed demand. I'm talking about more nuclear, more solar, massive tidal and hydroelectric projects, geothermal, fusion down the road, etc. Energy production on a scale that would make current production look minuscule by comparison.

Copious amounts of clean power would eliminate so many issues, water scarcity being one of them, since desalination is easy when you have a lot of energy. We can solve virtually every single environmental problem on this planet through massive applications of power, so power generation is what we should be focusing on.