How we use our water.

We are under 20 gallons per day per person.  The Riot4Austerity goal is 10 gallons per person per  day.  The almost 20 gallons we use includes some outdoor watering and some for my work as a costumer.  Textiles is a water intensive profession so we are proud to be as close as we are.

Toilet:  We practice a modified mellow yellow.  We all use the same water in the morning and the evening because everyone goes at about the same time during those periods.  On the weekend, everyone cleans up after themselves.  This is much easier if you have only 1 toilet in the house which is the case with us.  Its a 1.2 gallon low flow single flush toilet.  You can fiddle with the mechanism to make a toilet use even less than its designed to use whatever that may be.  I clamped down  the hose that fills the bowl so now only a very little water heads to the bowl.  Thus far it hasnt affected how the toilet works.

Washing Machine:  We have an large capacity horizontal axis washing machine (3.29 Cuft).  My husband and I re-wear many of our clothes.  My husband less so because he has a corporate job and they are just less understanding about these things.  Our sons clothes are normally soiled every day.  Our washing machines uses 3.6 gallons per cycle and into it we can place about 20 articles of clothing.  Thats less than 1 quart of water per piece of clothing.  Although we might be able to wash more efficiently by hand, I sort of doubt it.

Faucets:  We rarely turn the water on more than half way.  The only thing I use full water for is rinsing the toothpaste out of my tooth brush or filling the bath tub.  Really, thats it.  It drives me nuts when Im in a public place and people use the faucets full blast to wash.  Also training yourself to reach for the cold water is important.  I never wait for the hot water to get to the sink unless Im washing my face.  I take advantage of the cold water to brush my teeth before washing my face.

Bathing:  My husband bathes daily during the week.  I shower every few days with the occasional bath.  Our son alternates between bathes and showers a few per week.  We are fortunate that our water heater is right under the bathroom so we cannot even fill our small watering can with cold water before the hot water arrives so we mostly fill our watering can at the kitchen sink waiting for the hot water to arrive before doing dishes.

Showers:  A good low flow shower head is important.  We have one we really like called the Incredible Head.  It give a wide spray that feel luxurious and you can turn it off at the nozzle so you can turn off the water while shampooing.  If you want to get away from washing your hair every day you have to retrain you hair.  Your hair will put out oils based on the rate you wash it.  Thus if you normally wash it every day, it will get oily very fast.  If you normally wait between washings, it will take longer for your hair to get oily.  If you are accustomed to washing your hair every day, dont try going right to every 3 days.  The results will be gross.  

Dish Washing:  We have no water restircter on the kitchen faucet as we have a portable dishwasher.  My philosophy on dish washer is that you dont know how much you can put in it until you have tried over loading it.  Try cramming in more than you think will fit.  More and more until things start coming now uncleaned.  Then you know how much it can handle.  Ours works with dishes heaped on top of each other.  HA!  That cuts down on running the dishwasher.  I believe hand washing is best, but that portable dishwashers are better than built in dishwasher.  Portable dishwasher are great because you can leave the pots and pans in the sink and by the time the dishwasher is done the pans are most of the way to clean.  You can also use the cold water that comes from the faucet to fill the watering can or to wash the cast iron pans.  You have no way to recover the cold water with a built in.

The last water toy I want to add to our home is a water interrupter pedal.  It allows you to turn the water off with a foot or knee pedal so you dont have to re-adjust the water temp while hand washing dishes or washing your face.  NEAT!

As I said, that 20 gallons per day includes some fresh outdoor water used for the veggie beds.  That will go up as the summer gets hotter.  The rain barrel dosnt provide enough water pressure to work well with a soaker hose and grey water isnt well suited for veggies.  We use the grey water to feed an underground drip system for our lawn and the rain water goes to feed the less sensitive edibles like the kiwi and boysenberry.