18 November 2010
Water proved to be one of the easier tasks to accomplish during the project. With my water budget at 15 gallons a day (calculated from average rainfall amounts and divided into # of residents in my house), I was able to stay within this water range fairly easily for the ffirst two months of the 100 days (August 15-Oct 15). 
By tracking all water use and measuring the flow rates of all water fixtures I was able to identify what daily uses were big water users and target those for saving water. I calculated that before the project I used 54.4 gallons of water a day, and there were three primary suspects for this water over-use: showering (20 gallons), laundry (6 gallons) and toilet flushing (10 gallons). All of the other uses (except dish washing) of water were under 1 gallon per day which didn't leave much room for changing habits. Therefore, by focusing on how to decrease my water use for showering, laundry and toilet flushing alone I could significantly decrease my water use.
For showering, I took 1 gallon bucket showers. I used a bucket and sponge standing in the bath tub and found that this was more than enough water to wash up every morning without washing my hair. With pretty dry hair I could pretty easily get away with only washing it once a week, so Sunday's became the big 'wash day'. Once a week I would heat 5 gallons of water using a solar camp bag and take a longer bucket shower to wash my hair. I realized when changing my showering habits that taking a long morning shower was more of a ritual than serving a real important purpose. Rinsing off with significantly less water did the trick just as well and saved 95% of the water.
I changed my laundry habits from using 42 gallons/load in the washing machine to only about 12 in a 5 gallon bucket hand washing. Hand washing allowed me to use about 1/2 the detergent I normally use as well. My method was to fill the 5 gallon bucket with clothes and detergent, let it soak and then use my feet to stomp it. I was surprised to see how dirty the water got even when my clothes didn't seem that dirty. After the water was pretty dirty I would dump and refill the bucket with 2-3 gallons of water and squeeze and shake the clothes by hand to get the rest of the detergent out. Lastly, I rinsed with another 3 gallons of water and hung clothes to dry in the bathtub. Less convenient than throwing clothes in the washing machine? yes. But it was sort of a stress reliever and satisfying to actually see my clothes getting clean and knowing it was only using my energy.
Lastly, toilet flushing uses 2.6 gallons of water per flush. I cut this use by a gallon by putting a milk carton filed with water in my tank to lower the water level for each flush. I estimated that before the project I flush about 5 times a day. To cut down I fell back on an old saying, "If its yellow, let it mellow..." which went over fairly well with my roommates (they are doing it now too). These changes reduced my toilet flushing water from 10 gallons down to only 3.2 (two flushes per day).
However, as the weather changed, so did my priorities concerning water use. While it was easy to shower with 1 gallon of water in warmer weather, I found myself spending the whole day cold after a cold morning rinsing. I changed my showering habits to taking 3 minute showers twice a week. I installed a cheap flow shut-off valve on the shower head which allowed me to turn off the water when I wasn't rinsing (and not have to run water again to get the right temperature back). I also found that in cooler weather as I began preserving foods with less fresh produce available, I needed less water to rinse vegetables.
