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The following is a guest blog feature courtesy of Conservation Covers…

To Pool Owners,

It always astounds me that the largest WASTES of water and electricity in the home are ignored. And by largest we really mean the largest – your pool.

By simply covering your pool you reduce pump and chemical usage by 75%, instantly reducing water evaporation to ZERO!! The swimming pools in California, Arizona and Texas lose its full volume of water every year through evaporation. A 20,000 gallon pool will evaporate 18,000 gallons throughout the year. Obviously, 18,000 gallons of water is extremely valuable yet its loss is usually ignored when we speak about droughts and water-saving measures.

Also ignored is the eight kilowatts of energy it takes to power the motors that filter a pool. Eight kilowatts a day is almost 3,000 kilowatts a year. By applying a pool cover, this kind of usage can be cut 70-80% because heat and light can’t enter the pool. That means the pool filter only needs to run for two hours a day instead of eight.

Pools are actually only used an average of one to two percent of all the hours in a year which means the potential for conservation is ENORMOUS! In Los Angeles alone, 2.7 billion gallons of water evaporate every year from pools and over a billion kilowatts are used for electricity. All these savings can be reached with a lightweight cover that can be removed in 3-4 minutes for swimming.

This is an important ecological matter that needs to be addressed. Everyone who is being asked to reduce their water usage by 15-20% could easily achieve that by simply covering your pool with a UV protected cover. Spread the word, and cover your pool!

Sincerely,

Conservation Covers

www.conservationcovers.com

Jeans. We all love them. We all have them. In fact, most of us have a lot of them. According to a Cotton Inc. survey, the average American owns 8.3 pairs of jeans. American teens average 11 pairs of jeans. As much as I love jeans I actually come in on the low end of this survey at 5 pairs, 2 of which I haven’t worn in years.

Having this many jeans already seems a bit excessive. But when you factor in that it takes 1,800 gallons of water to grow enough cotton to make just one pair of jeans, this suddenly seems to go far beyond excess. It’s unreasonable to suggest that we no longer buy jeans or condemn those that do. After all, jeans are as much a part of America as apple pie and angry political debates.

But armed with this statistic it does seem that we should find a use for the jeans we all have soaking up space in our closets. If we’re going to use the water to grow the cotton to make the jeans, let’s put our old jeans back to use.

So in addition to asking you to follow our more traditional water saving tips we’d also like to ask that you donate your old jeans. Make them useful again by donating them to your local Goodwill and we’ll dramatically reduce our water consumption. Not only will our environment thank you but so will the person you just helped get a new pair of jeans.

Two years into an ambitious five-year plan to improve energy-efficiency, recycling rates and greenhouse-gas emissions, Boeing has completed a project expected to save 870,000 gallons of water annually. Trying to save this much water across 23 buildings in Southern California is no easy task and we applaud the steps they took to make it happen. 

Boeing partnered with Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to install motion-activated faucets and water-saving toilets throughout their 23 El Segundo facilities. Even before the five-year plan took effect in 2007, Boeing has worked to reduce its environmental impact. Since 2002, Boeing has reduced its water consumption by 29 percent at all U.S. operations facilities. Not bad. But their outlook for the future is even better. 

Craig Cooing is VP and general manager of Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems and we’re impressed with the way he’s handling the announcement. “This accomplishment demonstrates our commitment to operational efficiency and environmental stewardship, but we have more work to do to further reduce our impact on the environment.”

Kudos Craig! Environmental accomplishments need to be celebrated but then we need to immediately ask what’s next or can we do more? We’re happy to see Boeing doing this and we hope more follow in their foot steps.

It’s likely the last time any of us spent any time caring about boiling water we were in our high school chemistry class laughing at our friend’s safety goggles and giggling about the word beaker.  Since then the boiling of water has been an after thought, reserved for such delicacies as macaroni and cheese and ramen noodles.  But the truth is that unless you’re meticulously measuring the amount of water boiled, you’re probably using far more water than necessary. 

Enter the Eco Kettle – a water storage and preparation device that ensures only the necessary amount of water is measured and boiled. The patented “dual chamber system holds 1.5 liters ready for use that is released into a separate chamber when an amount is entered on the measuring button.  All it takes is filling it up, deciding how much water to boil, pushing a button and wah lah! Any amount from one cup to full capacity instantly measured and boiled. 

Anyone from gourmet chef to dorm room amateur can benefit from the Eco Kettle.  And by pressing a few buttons to measure their water use, they’re helping all of us in the necessary effort to conserve water.

Pick up your Eco Kettle at ecokettle.com.