FREMA
WATER USAGE.
World WATER scarcity.
EXPLAIN WATER USAGE.
1. THE WORLD’S WATER SCARCITY PROBLEM.
We need to stop and think about the global warming event. At present 50% of the world population is water poor. That means they do not have sufficient access to potable, safe water. The international experts believe that this will reach 70% in the near future. The global warming is most evident in the very slow warming of the oceans. That has a huge effect on the evaporation rate of the water and it means more moisture in the air, therefore more turbulence, more violent and extreme weather. In some areas, most likely the tropics, more severe rain and frequent flooding events. Yet in some further inland areas, away from the coast lines, plus the already dry, arid and desert like areas, this will increase with extensive and more frequent droughts.
Here is a map of the desert areas. Some 33% of the land area is desert, but when we expand that to arid lands, the percentage becomes 42%. When we think of deserts, we think of hot sand, but those only represent 7% of the land. The icecaps in the polar regions are arid, but that is only 3%.
If you are interested in some more information, with links below the map.
Australia has a rather large land area which is classed as arid. Those areas are likely to have more extensive and more frequent severe dry spells. Hence water usage control becomes very important. Already we experienced water rationing in Sydney in 2003 to 2005 and 2019 to 2020.
The deserts along the sea (Peruvian) and (Namib in the South of Africa) have always miffed me. How can there be a desert so close to the huge ocean?
The reason is as follows. Those deserts have a cold ocean current running past the coast. As a result the water evaporation from the ocean is reduced. Therefore the air carries very little water and thus very limited cloud formation. That means very little or no rain.
2. WHERE DO WE USE WATER IN OUR HOMES?
I think the simplest start is to make a list.
- We drink water.
- We cook with water.
- We regularly wash our hands.
- We clean the dishes.
- We shower and carry out hair and teeth hygiene.
- We wash our clothes.
- Then the toilet needs to be flushed.
- And then we may ??????
- hose down the path or patio. (hard surfaces)
- wash our car or boat.
- water the garden.
- cleaning windows.
- top up the swimming pool.
- and perhaps some uses I forgot.
In the above list there is a pattern.
The lines 1 and 2 are essential for a healthy life. So, we leave them alone.
Following are five lines that can be adjusted for a better outcome. I have a separate section for each line.
Finally, number 8, is a list of luxury choices and in a time of water stress those non-essential or discretionary tasks that could be eliminated alltogether.
Point by point explanation on how to save water.
3. WASHING HANDS.
Washing hands. I had two high school students give me a hand with a job on the property. When it was time to go home, it was washing hands time. The boys were left to do that. I was outside and I heard the water pump running on and on, for about 10 minutes. It was obvious they did not know how to wash their hands.
How should we wash hands? We are ready, turn on the tap at a moderate rate (not full bore) and wet your hands then turn off the tap. This will take 3-5 seconds. Now apply soap and rub your hands and make the soap lather thoroughly to cover the whole hands. This might take 15-30 seconds, but no water usage during that time. Now we turn on the tap, moderate rate again, and rinse off the foam. This might take 6-10 seconds. Finally we dry the hands with a towel. Job done.
I am showing a picture taken with a microscope of the human skin, see below. Running water does not remove bacteria from between those flakes. It happens when we rub the lather on the hands, with a little water, which due to the lower surface tension, can penetrate under those flakes and remove the bacteria. Then at the end the water washes the bacteria containing foam away.
A tap can run at a water rate of 4L/min. So we can wash hands using 1.0L against conventional 3.5 L, a saving of 2.5 L. If we wash hands 10 times per day, we use 10L/day/person and that is a saving of 25 L/day/person.
4. CLEANING DISHES.
Cleaning dishes is already an item of public discussion.
- Present day procedure. Most people fill the sink full of warm water and then after they wash the dishes they rinse the soap off the dishes in the adjoining sink. A huge waste of resources.
- The motto of the manufacturers of the dishwashers. They claim that they are more efficient, because the water is recycled. And that is true.
- But we can still do better. I wash my dishes immediately after eating. Don’t let the food dry up!
- Rinsing away the soap is not necessary. Soap is a harmless substance, we spread it all over our body. Ingesting a minute amount left on a dry dish does no harm. So we eliminate that.
- Filling the sink with warm water is overdoing it. I put about 5cm of cold water plus a squirt of detergent in the sink and I put the dishes in one by one and use a brush to scrub the surfaces. The food residue, I just ate, washes away and I remove the piece to let it dry.
- Also most people use warm or even hot water. That is an enormous waste of energy. There is no need for that with most dishes. I wash most of them in cold water. But if there is something fried or fatty I boil 500ml of water in a jug. Next I place the plates into the sink, squirt some dishwash detergent onto them and pour the hot water onto them. Then I leave that sit for say a half to one hour. After that I scrub the dish and remove it from the sink and onto the drying tray. That works fine.
- I do not flush the water away after breakfast or even lunch. I only do that if it is visibly dirty. So I may use one or two 5cm fills of water in my sink.
- A number of times a day I take the tea towel and wipe the almost dry dishes. That removes any soapy residue that is of concern for some people.
The amount I use in the sink is just 10L. A dishwasher uses between 10 and 17L/day, so yet another saving of 7L/day.
5. TAKING SHOWERS.
- Most people in the developed world are taking one shower per day. But the statistics are quite varied by region and country. Here are some examples of showers per week:
- Australia, USA 80% -7 x 8 minute showers.
- France, Spain >70% – 7 x 9 min showers plus 2 baths per week.
- Average western world 50-60% -7 showers.
- Figures are sketchy but as an estimate, I guess no more than 2 billion people shower daily, which by default means 6 billion do not.
- People in the developing nations may not shower at all. They might hand wash from a small tub once a week or fortnight. Are those less clean? They may have some body odour, (we all do), but their health is not affected. During the World War II and for some years after, as a child, I washed once a week from a tub.
- The habit of showering daily in western society is apparently created by vigorous soap marketing campaigns. Two billion of us have been brainwashed to shower with detergents daily. Plus we use way too much water. So do we need it, is it good for us? Harvard Health says NO.
- Please take particular note of the paragraph about the immune system trigger. I have an interesting personal addition to this:
- Tetanus is a bacterium that leaves spores everywhere around us. These spores are mostly in soil , faeces and rusty parts like, barbed wire. When the spores enter our body, (often via a cut or wound) we get the tetanus infection. It is not spread from human to human. I have my regular 10 year tetanus booster injection. And guess what happens? For two years following the booster, I do not get a cold, whereas I normally get one sometimes two per year. This is confirmation of the immune system readiness trigger principle.
- I am now in the habit to take a shower every second day, (meaning 7 per fortnight), unless I have done a very sweaty job during the day. I try and limit my shower time to 4 sometimes 5 minutes and I don’t have the tap full bore.
- I use only soap, this washes away quickly, and not detergents. I wet and rub my hair during every shower I take, but no detergents. Every second shower I use either soap or a tea-tree oil shampoo, which extends my shower by about 1 to 2 minutes. Using shampoo is too harsh, it dissolves all the protective oils in the skin. (I used to work for Unilever for 5 years). Using too much shampoo dries the skin out and can create dandruff. The skin replaces the cells regularly and the dead skins are being shed. When you have a dry scalp this effect becomes more pronounced. So now we need a special anti-dandruff shampoo for the rest of your life. And so it goes on.
6. WASHING CLOTHES.
Washing clothes. In the developed world we use a tumbling or agitating washing machine. The water contains a surfactant like soap or detergent.
In the olden days we rubbed the clothes, with dollop of green soap, over a ribbed metal washboard. The rubbing motion, as in the case of washing hands, makes the water-surfactant media move in-between the threads and loosen the dirt. The agitator in the washing machine does the same thing.
In the developing nations people often wash their clothes in the creek or river and smash or rub them over the rocks.
So, how can we in our developed world reduce our water and energy use for clothes washing?
- Firstly I only wash in cold water. In fact I do not even provide warm water to the laundry. The modern detergents handle cold water washing comfortably. Heating water is one of the top demands on electricity. This makes warm or hot water a luxury. If something needs a warm soak, I will put it in the tub and boil a jug to add to the soak.
- I accumulate clothing until I have a full load in the machine. I wish I could reduce the amount of water for the rinsing cycle, because it won’t require a full load. The soap will come off when the clothes get splashed around.
I use 100 Ltr for 1 load of washing per fortnight. Mind you sometimes I have an additional separate wash for bedlinen or cardigans. So, lets say 140 Ltr or 10 Ltr /day.
7. FLUSHING TOILETS.
Flushing the toilet is a necessarily evil, if you have a flushing – septic type of toilet. But there is the possibility to use a waterless toilet and I mention here the composting toilet (this toilet still involves digging and hence I don’t think it is suitable for the agricultural tenancy) and the incinerating toilet. I have, some time ago, dismantled my septic toilet system and the septic tanks and installed an incinerating toilet. It works like a dream and uses NO WATER. The purchase prices sounds expensive compared to a flushing toilet, but when you add the cost of a septic system or composting toilet, your are many thousand of dollars ahead.
When I was having a normal water flushing toilet I used about 65 Ltr/day for that, that water usage is all saved.
8. WHAT ABOUT THOSE OTHER WATER USES?
Those other uses, are really non essential tasks. When we had water shortages and Dam levels were low restrictions were introduced. We also developed water wise rules. I noticed there is no uniformity in those rules between states and even towns. The trigger point is usually related to lower water level in the Dams. Most towns have just 4 levels, but some have more. All this started in 2002 when the Dam levels were the lowest for 100 years. But we had more restrictions in 2019 and they will happen again and again.
- At level 4 you cannot do any of those tasks.
- At level 3 you cannot use automatic garden watering systems. Also you can no longer top up your swimming pool. My last couple of years in Sydney I had a backyard pool, and it sure affected my water consumption. I think pools are a huge luxury, that may go out of vogue in future years.
- Even at level 2 there is no window cleaning, no washing hard surfaces and car washing can only be done in a commercial car wash, because the recycle their water. In fact that should be a permanent rule.
- At level 1 there are minor restrictions on all those tasks, like only use hand held hoses or use a bucket to wash cars and windows. Garden watering only before 9am and after 6pm.
9. WHAT IS MY WATER USAGE NOW?
By the way, Maxwell Smart was the main player of the spy comedy Get Smart, launched in 1965 and ran 138 episodes.
Please take note: the average city dweller consumes about 200 to 250 L/day.
One water consumption we keep as is, which is the water that keeps us alive. The water we drink and use for cooking. So how much water do I use?
FRESH WATER drink & cook 6 L/day
hand wash 10 L/day-recyled
kitchen sink 20 L/day
total 36 to 40 L/day
This is the actual water I consume, which is only 20% of what a city dweller consumes.
(or a saving of 160 L/day.)
GREY WATER NOW shower 6-7min at 8L/min = 50 L/shower.
however I take a shower every 2nd day = 25 L/day
washing machine 100 L/wash per fortnight
which includes a small wash for towels & jeans
result is say 100 L/14 days = 7 L/day
total 32 say 35 L/day
So if I do not recycle my grey water, my total water consumption becomes 70 – 75 L/day. That means 38% of the city average. That means a saving of 125 L/day or 45,625 L/year.
I presently have 40,000 Ltr storage, plus some extra 1,000 L for the lab plus 1,000 for the hot house as well as about 5,000 Ltr in the grey water processing tanks.
PRIOR with toilet flushing I used 65 L/ day, but no more!
However the total consumption of 35L/day is recycled for use. I could easily shower daily, but I still believe that excessive cleaning and removing our natural protection is not good for us.
Leaving a true consumption of 30L/day.
Please note I have been showering and washing in recycled grey water for about 6 years now, and I am still running around, fit as a fiddle, and no funny spots on my skin. Plus, I have a laboratory, where I prepare bacteria cultures to check my process and check chemical criteria. I am still working on a simple control system that people without a laboratory can do. So, what I explained here is only the simple version. There is a lot more to it than that. We need to consider factors like water chemistry, accumulation, time, other losses, and monitoring. You cannot have everything, which means you cannot have 100% forever. Eventually you will have to dispose of some water in time and refresh it.
Research for that is still continuing.
In theory, with my water storage I can live of that for 2.5 years, without running into trouble. In practice?
Let us say my family is 2 people, then they will consume (ball park figure) about 20,000 L/year.
My current water storage ready for use is 25,000 L fresh + 15,000 L grey, plus some 5,000 Ltr in the collective grey processing tanks, but that varies.
So for 2 people consuming 20,000 L/year that means 2 years without topup. Way more than I need.
But the government wants remote occupants to have water reserves for fire fighting. For a 1-2 ha property that means 20,000 Ltr. Two of my tanks have connections (Storz 65mm) for fire hoses. (15,000 Ltr total.) But if need be, I can transfer water from any tank to any other tank. My hilltop tanks total 25,000 Ltr.
Move to water page 2, water collection
Move to water page 3, water recycling
