Water – Use It Wisely invites you to check out its new video series, “Tinkling with Ryan.” The series provides regular entertaining takes on water conservation news and tips. In the first episode, Ryan shows you how easy it is to install a water-saving shower head. Believe me, if this guy can do it so can you.
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
Tomorrow, October 8, Guy Laliberte, Founder of Cirque du Soleil and President of the One Drop Foundation is launching Moving Stars and Earth For Water, and online event to raise awareness of water-related issues. The event brings together personalities including former U.S. VP Al Gore, Dr. David Suzuki, U2 and Shakira to heighten awareness of water-related issues in a way only Cirque du Soleil could.
While the event will certainly be spectacular (and you can find out all the details about how you can participate here), visit Laliberte’s “One Drop Foundation” site and pledge a behavior that will make an immediate impact. The event might be tomorrow but water conservation is something you can pledge to do year round.
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.
Remember how your mom would ask if you’d jump off a bridge just because your friend did? Of course you wouldn’t, but now some scientists are betting that if a group of friends jumped off that bridge you might very well follow.
What does this have to do with water conservation? Well, conserving water is about adopting behaviors and it turns out it’s far easier to adopt behaviors as part of a group than on your own. As ASU professor, Robert Cialdini found out, simply changing the wording on hotel towel reuse signs can contribute to saving 7 trillion gallons of water – a theory dubbed “social proof.”
Not convinced? Check out the study here.
On October 5, the United Nations and Habitat for Humanity is asking everyone to come together in recognition of “World Habitat Day” – a day to stand up and let it be known that affordable, adequate housing should be a priority everywhere.
According to the United Nations, more than 100 million people in the world today are homeless and millions more face severe housing problems including inadequate sanitation, security, and electricity.
So what can you do to make a difference come October 5?
Making water conservation easy to understand is one of the biggest challenges we face everyday. Here’s a great example of how IBMs’ “A Smarter Planet” series is combining creative and simple to show how important and easy conserving water really is…
If you’ve been considering converting your grass into a colorful low-water-use landscape, a local class will show you the easy step-by-step methods. And, you may even be eligible for a rebate!
The City of Chandler is presenting a free workshop, Basic Yard Makeovers on Tuesday, September 1, from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Call 480-782-3580 to register for the program.
Many of the partners in the Arizona Water – Use It Wisely coalition offer FREE workshops or classes with expert speakers willing to share their knowledge. You can learn about designing a colorful water-saving, low maintenance landscape, programming an irrigation controller, attracting wildlife to your yard, selecting low-water-use plants, pruning, watering your landscape, making compost, or herb and vegetable gardening in the low desert. There are even walking tours of local Xeriscape gardens.
Explore the new on-line calendar on the Water – Use It Wisely home page and find out more about conservation events scheduled in the metropolitan Phoenix area. See for yourself. Click on the calendar on the left navigation bar ‘Learn about local events & classes’ to see what’s happening in your city or town.
Even though we may not understand all of the words in this Brazilian made water-conservation PSA, we’re pretty sure we get the message.
In important water-conservation news, Water – Use It Wisely spokesperson and noted useless handyman, Ryan La Rosa installed a WaterPik EcoFlow shower head without help or major panic attack. Such was the first endeavor of it’s kind that La Rosa completed, leaving his wife thoroughly impressed and proving just how easy it can be to install a simple water-saving device.
Understanding that few would believe he could achieve this task, La Rosa documented his progress in the photographs below…
Step 1
And so it begins...
Step 2
Here, our hero nearly gives up after spending 15 minutes attempting to open package. Thankfully, he perseveres.
Step 3
La Rosa uses the helpful monocle included in packaging to study directions (come to find out later, the monocle is actually the nut used to attach shower head).
Step 4
Unscrewing original shower head should be easy (unless you're short and surrounded by distracting 1960's bathroom tile).
Step 5
Old shower head proved no match for tool (common term used to describe both wrench and man pictured above).
Step 6
They say it's as easy as screwing new shower head into place. Clearly they've never dealt with a man of such few skills or common sense.
Step 7
Wow! It's true! A brand new shower head in minutes! Next step is to update tile by a decade to 1970's print.
Step 8 – The Ultimate Test
Perfection! Newly installed and instant results. In fact, our hero felt so good about his new water-saving habit he took it a step further and reduced his usual shower performance of Les Miserables from the entire production to only the first act.
Truth be told, installing this new water-saving shower head took all of 10 minutes and seriously I’ve never installed nor fixed anything in my life. And it works great too. Any noticeable difference in the stream (which trust me is nearly none) is made up for in the fact that you’re doing something good and saving water.
So, I insist that you too get your own Water Pik Eco Flow shower head. Interested? Just click here and you’re on your way.
