Mine is 1,117 gallons per day, as calculated by the H20 Calculator. Frankly, that’s much bigger than I would have thought, even if slightly below the US average of 1190. But my living arrangements are hardly typical:
* I live in an apartment and have no lawn of any sort [SButtonZ button="digg"]
* I don’t own a car (so no washing)
* My shower is “low flow”
* My dishwashing habits are a bit erratic — which must add up to some water savings
Sure, I leave the water running while brushing my teeth and I don’t “let it mellow” as the website so artfully suggests–but still, 1,117 gallons a day? That’s enough to fill a small pool a couple times a week. Where does it all come from?
The overwhelming majority of this water use–one discovers upon reading the personalized analysis–is a result of eating meat and dairy products (as I do). That alone works out to more than 500 gallons, or half the total. Eating plant products uses another 500 gallon, but that’s not exactly discretionary…
Does PETA sponsor the calculator or something? No–it’s a pretty impressive coalition that includes The Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future. There doesn’t seem to be an institutional bias against carnivorism.
That said, the site’s takeaway–intentional or not–can be neatly summarized as: Meat and dairy production are so water intensive that that choice dwarfs any other basic lifestyle choices or attempts to conserve. Including “letting it mellow.”
Tags: NEWFANGLED THINGS
Isn’t growing food extremely water intensive? I mean, I know the preparation of meat and the sustenance of livestock is amazingly water intensive (obviously)… but it would seem irrigation would be, also.
Michael,
Right — according to this calculator a vegan diet uses 500 gallons a day. If you eat meat and dairy, then you double that amount. I tweaked the piece to make that clearer.
JR
I got 862, though I had to try and fudge a little… I’ve got two infant sons, so they don’t use as much water, in general… they drink formula and eat baby food so I said they ate vegetarian…
My question with their implication that meat and dairy production is water intensive is this: What water do cows (and pigs, and beef cattle, and chickens) really drink? Yes, they have a water trough that likely comes from some sort of spicket that in turn feeds off of the treated water that is safe to drink… Or, because they’re on a farm, do they just drink well water, which really isn’t cost intensive in terms of making water potable. And the other water that the animals drink are from streams creaks and rivers and ponds that are on the farm property. These are fed by rainwater, snowmelt, or natural springs and, though they are fresh water, they aren’t necessarily in the same class as the water that comes out of your faucet.
I understand the water conservation ideas, I really do. That’s why my family uses a faucet filter instead of getting bottled water (because my wife doesn’t like the taste from the tap). But how in the world is my decrease in water usage going to help people in Africa and elsewhere who don’t have access to water? It really isn’t logical that I have any individual impact on that, short of giving money to programs that help to improve their way of life. Of course, I’m going to be a good steward with what I have… I’m not going to waste water just because I can… but it isn’t feasible or economical to transport water the way that the Romans did… there need to be other solutions to help improve people’s standard of living. And by me “letting it mellow” I’m not helping their standard of living… and I’m decreasing mine. Doesn’t make much sense to me.
PointSpecial,
Yeah — tend to agree. Here in the northeast, there is nothing close to a water shortage (most of the time). The only convincing argument I’ve heard for conservation on the “let it mellow” scale is that processing wastewater requires some energy. So to some extent your water footprint affects your carbon footprint.
JR
I was disappointed in the Power usage calculation. It treats grid electricity and ‘green’ sources as either/or. at least some of my power comes from the wind farms around Summerset, PA and the Niagra hydro generators.
Most of the water used in growing meat doesn’t go to watering the animal itself, but to growing its food. It takes 10 lb of plant food to make one lb of beef. If you want to eat the most ecofriendly mass produced meat, eat chicken.
I agree with JR. Living in the NE US, there is no compelling reason to save water. Growing up on a farm where we were reliant on our own well and spring, I got a very clear picture of water usage. Not to mention, our using water didn’t remove anything from the cycle, it only slowed it a bit. Everything ended up percolating down into the creek eventually whether it passed through a sheep, a washing machine, a human, or a fish pond first. The concern comes in when we buy the water in food that has been shipped in from the great plains or arid parts of Montana.
The modern America factory farm aside, traditional methods of raising meat are actually not very water intensive. Take Argentina, which uses a method similar to what was common in the US until after WWII (as I understand it), the cattle are raised on grasslands which are not conducive to farming for crops. Since the cattle are almost entirely free-range and grassfed, they take no water out of the ecosystem, and since the land is not easily used for growing crops, the Argentine herders are actually getting more food out of the country than would be possible if meat weren’t raised.
The problems arise when you start feeding the cattle grain.
The “saving water in the US won’t help someone in Africa” reminds me of the “fussy eater” (to use Mr. Carlin’s term) who didn’t want to eat his broccoli. His Dad told him, “Some little boy in West Africa (or other malnourished area) would love that broccoli!” So the boy goes into the next room and brings back a roll of postage stamps, saying “how many of these would it take to send my broccoli to that African boy?”
Jeb, I cannot understand – and please help me to – the idea behind leaving the water on while you brush your teeth. It sounds so absurd to me, like it’d have to be an active attempt to waste water. Please explain the rationale – is it that so you don’t have to turn the faucet off and on one more time? I’ve never done this in my life, and cannot understand why anyone would – it’s just so insanely easy to NOT watch yourself wasting water…
This list ends up penalizing people that aren’t either of two extremes: for example, we have a small, portable dishwasher but we still do dished by hand a lot. We have regular toilets but put milk jugs in them to reduce water usage.
Aaron B: I can’t speak for Jeb, but my method of brushing my teeth consists of putting toothpaste on the brush, brushing my teeth a bit, running the brush under the tap, and then brushing some more and looping until I feel I’m done. The extra water helps rinse out my mouth without actually having an extra rinsing step, and gives the toothbrush something to rub against after much of the toothpaste gets spit out on the first spit. Probably not the most efficient way to brush, but I don’t think it’s willfully wasteful.
Aaron B.,
Yeah — I mean, it’s one of those things I don’t want to encourage, of course. But I have given it some thought.
In a very practical sense, I let the water run so it will be nice and cool and fresh when I get a glass to drink before bed and after brushing my teeth. I live on the 5th floor and go to bed late, when generally there hasn’t been much water use in a few hours — so the water that comes out of the faucet at first tends to be warm and not very palatable.
Now, if I lived in LA or Denver or Atlanta or lots of other places, I wouldn’t do this. But NYC has *plenty* of water, so it’s not remotely a scarcity question. There is some energy involved in treating the water, of course. But not much — and I imagine its a lot less than the electricity required to keep a pitcher of water cool in the fridge.
So, that’s my thought process — I’d characterize it as strategic laziness.
Jeb