Precious drops of water

Droughts used to come and go, but the drought currently desiccating the western states might settle in for a generation or more.

In the opinion of some climate scientists, this drought is at least partly caused by global climate change with its record temperatures. We have already spewed so much greenhouse gas into the atmosphere that even if we stopped tomorrow —which, of course, we won’t— global temperatures will continue to rise for the foreseeable future.

Some say that one extremely dry year doesn’t make a drought, but the more prudent attitude is to hope for the best while preparing for the worst. As Rocky Mountain snowpacks recede farther each year and reservoirs in the Southwest and California threaten to dry up, we must be proactive in addressing water shortages before they become acute.

Overall water-use figures can be deceptive. For example, although household water consumption represents only 6.8 percent of the total U.S. fresh water use, all household water must, by law, be potable. A high-quality, energy-intensive product, potable water has been carefully gathered, stored, treated, tested and finally delivered through an elaborate series of pipes. Conserving potable water is as critical to our future as conserving the larger quantities of untreated water used by agriculture and industry.

Begin saving water by learning how much you’ve been using. Your water bill will show your meter reading, usually expressed as multiples of 100 cubic feet (748 gallons). Water use varies seasonally; most people use far more in the summer irrigating their lawns and gardens. So to gauge the success of your conservation measures, you’ll need to compare equivalent time periods.

Before taking any other conservation steps, follow a simple procedure to check your plumbing system for leaks. Read your water meter. (It doesn’t matter what the reading is, or even if you understand the numbers.) Make sure no one uses any water for three hours, then read the meter again. If the reading has changed, you have a leak — and your other conservation efforts will be partially nullified until it’s fixed. Even a small leak can waste 130 gallons of water per month, and an estimated 10 to 15 percent of all household water is lost through leaks.

Your next conservation strategy is the cheapest, but in some ways the hardest to implement: change your water-wastin’ ways. By taking a “sea shower” — wet down, soap up, rinse off — as opposed to letting the water run the whole time you shower, you can save up to 21 gallons. By turning off the sink tap except to rinse, you can save 9.5 gallons when brushing your teeth and men can save 19 gallons while shaving.

After you’ve repaired your leaks and changed your habits, install water-saving devices and appliances, in that order, working from the least-expensive, low-tech controls to the most expensive, high-tech gadgets.

The three biggest water users for most U.S. families are showers, toilets and landscaping.

An estimated 5 billion gallons — 22 percent of domestic water — is used each day for showering, and about half of that could be saved if everyone used a low flow shower head. Older models felt skimpy to many people, but today’s low flow shower heads incorporate aerators to give robust, comfortable showers.

The average family flushes the toilet 12 to 24 times a day, and toilets made before 1993 use 3.5 gallons per flush. Without spending any money, you can reduce that flow by 14 percent by placing a half-gallon plastic jug of water (capped) in the tank. Standard post-1993 toilets are far more efficient at 1.6 gallons per flush, saving 55 percent over the older versions, and the new dual-flush toilets that separate solid and liquid waste are even more efficient.

Landscaping water use varies widely with yard size and plant types. However, practices such as watering in the morning or evening, installing drip irrigation, mulching and landscaping with drought-resistant plants are guaranteed to save significant amounts of water. An edible landscape of fruits and nuts will even recycle a certain amount of water back to your dinner table.

The average American uses a whopping 100 gallons of potable water per day. By changing a few habits and modifying or replacing some of the water-consuming devices in your ecological house, you can reduce your use by 20 to 25 percent. If we all did that, we would save 3.8 trillion gallons per year. That’s a lot of payback for a little effort.

Philip S. (Skip) Wenz is a freelance writer specializing in ecological design issues. He was a general contractor, residential designer, teacher and writer in the in the San Francisco Bay Area and founded and for 10 years directed the Ecological Design Program at the San Francisco Institute of Architecture.