Save Water Now

Last week, as I was reading through my issue of The National Wildlife Federations magazine, I came across an article in which they interviewed Doug Kent about creating a carbon neutral, sustainable garden. In 2008, Doug was involved at the 19th Annual Southern California Spring Garden show, where he designed and built an "Ocean Friendly" garden and won Best Theme Presentation at the show. I volunteered with Doug for a day in 2008 in helping to setup the garden. The garden included innovate methods of reducing water runoff from the garden. It did this using native Southern California plants with low water requirements and landscape features to contain the water in the garden, instead of allowing it to run off into the street and the watershed. This garden therefore required less water consumption.

California is currently in it's third year of drought. Southern California gets most of its water supply from the Sierra Nevada and Rocky mountain snow packs during the dry seasons of spring and summer. Rising temperatures and increased rainfall, due to global warming may lead to a large reduction in the snow pack and therefore an even bigger water shortage for Southern California.

If CO2 emissions continue at their current level (fired by burning coal, oil, gas and single use products) then temperatures are likely to rise. Increased temperatures may bring increased rain fall to Southern California during the winter but it will result in dryer summers and a drastic reduction in the snow pack. This would pose a difficult problem for water managers in storing winter rainfall, reduce power production through hydro electrics and of course reduce snow recreation activities.

We therefore need to start reducing waste now. We have already discussed numerous ways to reduce waste. Here are 7 more ways we can reduce water waste inside our houses and how much water they can save.

1. Fix leaky faucets. This can save up to 20 gallons per day per leak.
2. Only wash clothing when you have a full load and save up to another 20 gallons per wash.
3. Only use the dishwasher with a full load and save up to 4.5 gallons per load.
4. Do not let the water run when you are rinsing dishes or brushing your teeth. This can save up to 2.5 gallons per minute.
5. Bath less often and instead take showers. When taking a bath save up to 25 gallons by only making the tub half full.
6. Shower with a friend or shorten the time you spend in the shower. Every minute less you spend in the shower can save 2.5 gallons.
7. Fix leaky toilets. This can save as much as 50 gallons a day per toilet. If your toilets are old you can also upgrade to a high efficiency toilet and look out for the rebates from the water companies.

Spring is almost here and we are looking forward to a good period of activity. The team at GoGreenMug will be involved with Earth Day on April 22 and International Surfing Day on July 21 as well as other environmental activities. With Earth Day just over 2 weeks away we have decided to offer a 20% discount at http://www.gogreenmug.com to promote reducing waste at coffee shops and using less disposable coffee cups.