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📝 In This Week’s Nutty Goodness
This Might Suit Your Fancy: Resources for calculating how much water your home uses and where, sizing a rainwater tank and using grey water.
Where The Roots Meet The Soil: Hidden water sinks that you might now think of and how to help the climate through home water conservation. Can you imagine if we got the 3,000 gallons of water it takes to create a smartphone every time we bought one? I even get into hidden water usage in your home activities.
Inspirational Stories: Willow Branch Creek Restoration Texas 4 Big Wins, A Year After Klamath Dam Removal, and Field Notes From Freshwater Restoration Projects in Canada
🐝 This Might Suit Your Fancy
Sizing A Rainwater Tank, can be tricky, respond to this email if you need help figuring out what size is best for your situation. When you are buying one, don’t forget to consider shipping which can get expensive quickly.
Create An Oasis With Greywater, Art Ludwig wrote THE book on greywater systems that is referenced by all sort of people. This link takes you to his website but this book is available on Amazon and every other bookstore.
WaterCalculator.org, this site has a lot of good resources and a calculator to help you identify where you can make adjustments in your home.
🎙️Where The Roots Meet The Soil
Taking Action For The Climate At Home: Water
While I appreciate what Phoenix is trying to do by offering to pay people $2 per square foot of lawn they replace, I think there are bigger impacts on water conservation that don’t require as much effort.
There were a lot of proofs, no suggestions on what to replace the lawn with and for what impact? Instead of focusing just on using less water, I think smarter uses of water are important too.
For example, jeans take over 1,000 gallons of water to manufacture due to the high volume needed to grow cotton and the process / dying them. (source: Stacker.com)
I’m a big proponent of natural fibers and not wearing plastic but just a pair of cotton underwear can take over 100 gallons to make. Not to mention the heavy pesticides.
Your 3,000 Gallon SmartPhone, Doesn’t Sound As Smart
That’s right, the extracting, refining and chip rinsing take a toll. According to WaterCalculator.org, that computer in your pocket takes less than a desktop to make but it’s still chugging.
I have to wonder if their calculations take into account whether that water is reused, recycled or if that is water shared across numerous components. Still that’s a lot of water that we don’t receive with the end product. WaterCalculator.org
Is Paper (3 gallons) Really Better Than Plastic (22 gallons)?
I was skeptical of those numbers because it takes lot of water to grow a tree, much less a forest and paper production is very water intensive.
But then I read it again on a number of sites, that is 3 gallons per sheet of paper.
Let’s compare this, apples to apples, by looking at how much water to produce enough grocery bags that would carry the equivalent volume.
1,000 gallons of water to produce 1,000 paper bags
58 gallons of water to produce 1,500 plastic bags
Ummm, that is a bit different isn’t it? I’ll let you decide which you prefer.
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Plastic Diapers & Leather Shoes
Here’s where I get on my soapbox about hashing out the “right” things. I’ve raised two wonderful boys and I tried cloth diapers. There were a number of issues, cost being the first of those, but it came down to my ability to smell it twice and cleaning the cloth.
Instead of harping on plastic diapers come up with a better, less expensive way. Some people can’t even afford the plastic diapers. This is an bigger issue than just plastic or cotton.
Now as far as leather shoes go (2,100 gallons, stacker.com), I feel like these get selected because people don’t want to see animals killed because they only listed leather shoes.
The simple facts are, humans are omnivores and leather shoes don’t need to be replaced anywhere near as often as synthetic shoes.
The leather verses synthetic material shoe debate has to be looked at through a lifetime value lens otherwise it’s a useless argument.
That being said, a single pair of synthetic material shoes takes 2,100 - 2,400 gallons of water to make. (source: got sneakers.com)
🔖Did you miss the last article when I talked about Replacing Your Lawn: Rock, Paper, Garden?
Activities At Home That Take A Lot Of Water
That’s right, I’m about to get all up in your business. And for those of you seeing water costs rise, this might really help.
Flushing toilets for a day can take up to 70 gallons of water for a family of 4, there are low flow toilets now that reduce that volume to about 26 gallons per day according to the Lowes.com calculator.
Water faucets vary depending on use, for example a low flow kitchen faucet might use 5-7 gallons per day. While a low flow bathroom faucet would be 8-12 gallons per day. The average person is said to use 10 - 20 gallons of water per day.
It can be hard to sus out but the USGS says it comes down to about a 50% reduction when you start using low flow faucets & toilets.
Turning on anything that uses energy, electric or gas or coal. How much water is really dependent on where you live. This article by water calculator.org tries to tackle it.
Rainwater & Grey Water Usage
Recently, I was visiting family in California and we were discussing their new garden. We went over taking care of the soil so it would take care of their plants and eventually not need as much water.
That’s when the topic of rising water prices came up.
So I suggested they look into rainwater harvesting and grey water usage.
These are two sources that most people either don’t understand or aren’t yet equipped to take advantage of.
Rainwater harvesting can be as simple as directing your downspout towards a tree or area or your garden. But can include implementing grading, gentle channels that help direct water flow from the front of your house to the backyard or a rainwater tank for storage.
You should check your state and local laws to make sure you don’t get in any trouble. If you need assistance with finding these respond to this email and I’ll see what I can do to help you out.
🦋 Stay Inspired
Organizations Around The World Are Staging Eco-Interventions
A Stream Is Reborn, 4 Big Wins: Resource Environmental Solutions
Field Notes Freshwater Habitat Restoration: Canadian Freshwater Initiative
Till next time,
Elisa Navarette
P.S. Was this useful? Have ideas on what I should publish next? Tap the poll or reply to this email. I read every response.