How much water do you use during an average day? 80-gallons seems like a lot to me.

[rockne10]

" Currently, the average potable water use across the MWD’s service area — [B]including residential, commercial and industrial water use — amounts to 125 gallons per person per day."

There's the key. They are taking the daily total taken from their aquifer and dividing it by the population.
Sure, in my house I use less than 1000 gallons every three months; but there are industrial laundries, water bottling companies, car washes, etc., and, since I'm a consumer of those services, it's all in the total per person.

Years ago I visited my dad in San Diego. He lived in one of those gated townhouse communities. Instead of each townhouse having its own water heater, it was done in a central utility building. I couldn't believe how long it took to get hot water for a shower. In that community that's millions of gallons down the drain.
They could have thought ahead and put an on-demand water heater in every bathroom. That would have added a whole two-tenths of one percent to the price of the townhouse.

It's a good idea to conserve precious water everywhere, but especially in those arid climates that depend more and more on what appears to be less and less annual precipitation.
That's not an agenda; that's common sense.

[Greenstude]

Big ecological advantage of artificial turf: reduces unnecessary water consumption. Big ecological disadvantage: probably plastic, made from petroleum products. Which is better --- I do not know. Maybe there is yet another, better, solution.

[PackardV8]

Big ecological advantage of artificial turf: reduces unnecessary water consumption. Big ecological disadvantage: probably plastic, made from petroleum products. Which is better --- I do not know. Maybe there is yet another, better, solution.

Easy solution. Just do away with the municipal subsidies and price a round of golf at the real, total cost.

jack vines

[6hk71400]

On a Navy ship, you get 1 minute to get wet, shut off the water, 1 minute to soap up, 1 minute to rinse. Anything longer the Navy calls that a "Hollywood Shower" I have no idea what the water requirements are for any Naval vessel but I am sure it is closely monitored.

Out on the flightline on Air Force Bases, there were salt tablets, at least in Arizona to try to curb water use. At least there use to be.

Bob Miles
Water, water everywhere and all the boards did shrink. Water water everywhere, nor any drop to drink

[Hallabutt]

Big ecological advantage of artificial turf: reduces unnecessary water consumption. Big ecological disadvantage: probably plastic, made from petroleum products. Which is better --- I do not know. Maybe there is yet another, better, solution.

Grass is cool, AstroTurf heats up to ungodly temperatures. That is one of the reasons that uncovered stadiums have virtually all gone back to grass.

As for Las Vegas-They treat and return 90+% of their waste water back to Lake Mead for subsequent reuse.

[PackardV8]

As for Las Vegas-They treat and return 90+% of their waste water back to Lake Mead for subsequent reuse.

The Bellagio fountain alone loses twelve million gallons to evaporation each year. How do they return that to Lake Mead?

jack vines

[firestoper 25]

Come on Mr. V.......you & I know they keep it "in the cloud".

[rockne10]

Jack, it rains on Duluth.

[Hallabutt]

The Bellagio fountain alone loses twelve million gallons to evaporation each year. How do they return that to Lake Mead?

jack vines

Jack,

I'm just trying to report the news, I don't make it. I said 90+%, the article really said something like 94% but since I couldn't recall the exact figures I used a more generic number. Upon consideration I guess it has to be obvious that where ever a body of water sits in the desert there is going to be evaporation. There is also going to be ground absorption too, depending of course on where it is. I personally found it fascinating that LV had made the commitment to trying to make water source more sustainable.

As an aside, the flow of the Colorado and the resulting available water is less then a third of the volume that it once was. I read that dams up river was holding back water to be sure that there was enough electric generating capacity during the current draught.

[Jeff_H]

Just checked a few recent water bills. I am a 1 person household and work from home most of the time now so don't take a shower every morning like I used to when I went into the office every day.

Water use (assuming the meter is anywhere near accurate *). Is about 30 gal/day.

I expect typically a lot less unless I DO take a shower or runs a few loads of laundry .

Couple years ago, I seeded some grass in part of the yard and had to water it for a month. A relatively HUGE bill. I do not typically water the grass. It will come back. Not like some of the neighbors who have sprinklers on timers and water every day no matter it just rained 2" or not.

* a couple years ago the town replaced all the water meters for ones they could read remote and I did not have to read them myself. The old one was apparently grossly wrong and under-reporting.

[Buzzard]

We are most fortunate in that we have unlimited mountain spring water(no chlorine!!!!) and only have to conserve during the cold winter months when we shut it down (rely on stored H2O buried in the mountain until spring) to prevent freezing. We have 55 lbs pressure and 33 gallons(imperial) per minute.
We feel for those located in drought areas. I couldn't live where we were monitored by some government agency.
Bill

[Hallabutt]

About three decades ago I rented a house that I own to the sister of my x-wife. I was renting a forty five gallon gas hot water heater from the utility company. My sister in law almost immediately started complaining about running out of hot water when she showered. So I called the utility and a technetium met me at the house. After running a tub of hot water, checking the temp and the WH's recovery time, the tech pulled me aside. He asked me what her showering habits were like. Hell I don't know! He said that there was nothing wrong with the HW tank-which had enough recovery time to at least handle two showers, back to back. No not at the same time. At any rate he said that he had increased the water temp by 10 degrees beyond the temp stipulated by the utility, beyond that he could do nothing. So I had to go to my sister in law to ask he about her showering habits and try to get her to take shorter showers.

This thread, and a bit of research makes me aware of how out of whack her bathing habits had been. The average shower, as indicated here, should use 17 gallons of water. With my 45 gal tank, plus maybe 20% mix of cold water would have to mean that she was using 50-60 gallons of water for her shower!

The reason I brought this up is just to highlight how averages are skewed by a few gross abusers.

[Milaca]

I think I understand the problem, your ex-sister-in-law is a mermaid.