For Smart Irrigation Month here are a few amazing facts about water that help remind us of the importance of saving water everyday.
- There is the same amount of water on earth today as when the earth was formed. (Ewww factor or cool factor?) The water coming out of your faucet today could contain molecules ancient humans used thousands of years ago.
- Frozen water is lighter than water by about 9%, which is why ice floats in water. Remind me of this at the Expo and I will give you a Jain Blog sticker.
- If the world population continues to grow at the current rate, by the end of the century the world will have over 10 billion people (There are over 7 billion people today). Feeding this many people will require more food to be grown in the next 75 years than all the food ever produced in human history. This food will require lots of water and more efficient methods of irrigation.
- This is hard for most Americans to believe, a quarter of the world’s population is without safe drinking water. This impacts food production too. You can help by supporting organizations like Chapin Living Waters,
- Singing in the shower, next time you shower think about this instead. Two thirds of the water used in a home is used in the bathroom.
- Older toilets can use up to seven gallons of water per flush. At five flushes per day that is almost 13,000 gallons per year. The EPA has some recommendations about toilets here. Federal plumbing standards specify new toilets can only use 1.6 gallons per flush or almost 3,000 gallons per year. That is still a lot of clean drinking water per flush and also begs the question, why do we use clean drinking water in our toilets?
- In a five minute shower we use 25 to 50 gallons of water. If you take a Navy shower you will keep this to around 3 gallons of water. That is a boat load of savings.
- When water contains a lot of calcium and magnesium, it is called hard water. Hardware contributes to breakdowns in cooling towers and boilers. In homes we like to soften hard water which causes issues for our plants.
- A person can live about three weeks without food, but only about three days without water.
- The United States uses nearly 80 percent of its water for irrigation and thermoelectric power.
I hope you enjoyed these facts about water. The first step in water conservation is raising awareness of why we need to conserve. I hope you will take some time to share some of your favorite facts with others.
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