You can use a water conservation calculator to determine ways to save water in your home. Once you see where the majority of your water is going, you may be able to make significant changes in order to reduce the amount of wastewater that your home produces. Conserving water means using less water in the first place, as well as reducing amounts of wastewater. Reducing water consumption also reduces energy consumption.
Online Calculators
Using an online tool is a quick and easy way to find out your family's water consumption. In addition, most tools compare your usage to the usage of the average American family or the average household in a specific region or county. A fun challenge for the whole family is to make it a household goal to use only 50 percent of the average household.
South Florida Water Management District Calculator
The South Florida calculator is simple to use, and provides results and encouraging suggestions about conserving water. Start by entering the number of people in your household, and then enter number of minutes spent taking a shower and the number of baths your household takes each week. Report the type of shower, faucet, and toilet flow rates that are currently in your home; if you don't know these, get out a timer and a big container. Place a bucket underneath the shower and turn on the water, letting it flow for one minute. Turn it off and then measure how much water is in the bucket. Do the same for the faucets.
You also need to know how much water your washing machine and dishwasher use, and estimate how many loads of clothes you wash each week. Does your family water the lawn? If so, enter those numbers as well. Once finished, click on the calculate button to get your final results. This information reveals how much water your family uses each day, week and year, as well as what the numbers could be by switching out some of your faucets, showers and toilets for low-flow models. While purchasing a new dishwasher and washing machine is quite expensive, low-flow toilets and fixtures are very affordable, especially if you pay for water usage or disposal, or both.
Miami Dade County Water Conservation
Another Florida resource is the Miami Dade calculator. This calculator compares your usage to the average in Miami Dade county. If yours is well below, congratulate your family. If it's average or above, challenge your family to find ways to save water.
This is a great tool since the calculator allows users to input the exact number of gallons used by each machine and each fixture. If you know the usage of all of your appliances and faucets, this calculator gives the most accurate results. However, if you only know your toilet is a low-flow model but not how many gallons it uses, it's better to use one of the other websites that only discriminates between 'normal', 'low-flow' and composting toilets. H2O Conserve
The H2O Conserve calculator starts requiring you to select the state where you live, and how many people live in your home. Next, you enter the percentage of your electricity that is generated by an electric company. You then report if your showers, toilets and faucets are reduced flow. You then estimate how many minutes each person showers per day, and how many baths are taken in your household per week, month or year. Sink usage includes how many minutes are spent with the water running. Laundry loads per week, as well as the number of times per week the dishwasher is used come next. You then enter lawn and garden, pool and car washing amounts, followed by the dietary (cooking) habits of your family. Lastly, recycling is a topic and how you recycle as well as how much gasoline you use. At the end, your family's water footprint data appears as well as the individual water usage.
This is an excellent website not only for parents trying to conserve water, but also as an educational tool for your kids to understand the importance of turning off the water when brushing their teeth, and why they should keep showers short and baths to a minimum.
Find Savings Opportunities
Often significant volumes of water get wasted through inefficient household equipment or wasteful practices. A water conservation calculator determines where you currently use the most water and identifies areas of significant potential savings.
