Water Waste: 10 innovative techniques to save water (2024 guide)

While fossil fuels get most of the public’s attention, the shortage of another precious resource threatens to disrupt life on Earth. Reducing local water waste is a crucial piece of overall sustainability.

The Earth’s potable water supply faces risks from waste and pollution. Improving water efficiency gives nature time to replenish its stash. Fortunately, there are many innovative techniques individuals and local communities can use to cut back on wasting water — some are even free. Here’s what to know and how to take action.

Water Waste and the World’s Limited Supply

“Water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink.” The protagonist of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” utters these words while adrift at sea, perishing of thirst while surrounded by the stuff.

Coleridge may well have sounded an early environmental warning. While the Earth is unique in its water supply, only 3% is fresh, and a minuscule 1.2% is available for consumption1.

The rest is locked up in glaciers, ice caps, and permafrost — which face risks of their own. Four of Earth’s primary climate systems, including the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, are on track to collapse.

While such an event will usher in a host of catastrophic events, including rapidly shifting shorelines and the destruction of pricey real estate, the Earth’s freshwater supply will also be affected.

That’s bad news since water is crucial to survival. While the average person can last weeks, even a month or more without food, they’ll perish within three days of not having water — sooner if exposed to hot and dry conditions, another climate change risk.

It’s all pretty dire and scary news. What can individuals and communities do about it? Quite a bit, and finding the answers begins with identifying the source of the problem. Only then can effective action be taken.

Wasting Water — Who Are the Biggest Culprits?

The United States is one of the world’s largest water consumers, sucking up more than comparable countries like Canada, Russia, Germany, Japan and the United Kingdom2. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, here’s how the nation allocates its use:

• Power generation accounts for 41% of withdrawals, although much of the water is recycled, not “used.”

• Agriculture is the biggest consumer, accounting for 37% of withdrawals, although 17 times as much disappears due to evaporation or other loss.

• Public consumption accounts for 12%.
• Mining and industry use 6%.

Although public consumption doesn’t seem to contribute much to the overall water picture, consumers have the greatest impact on conservation there.

The average American family uses 300 gallons of water daily, primarily for indoor use like cooking, bathing, and cleaning3. How much of it goes down the drain unnecessarily? Consider these statistics:

• The average household’s water leaks account for nearly 10,000 gallons wasted each year.
• 10% of homes have leaks that waste more than 90 gallons per day.
• A leaky toilet can waste anywhere from 30 gallons a day to six per minute.
• The average 10-minute shower uses 25 gallons of water.

Properly maintaining your indoor plumbing makes a huge difference in reducing water waste. Additionally, improving efficiency is often a simple matter of shifting how you perform certain daily habits.

Community Water Wasters

Local communities also contribute to a lack of water efficiency in public consumption. Waste can occur from water-intensive projects and how developers design them. Proper planning and taking remedial measures where necessary can preserve the supply. Additionally, it is essential for communities to find water transport solutions that optimize distribution and reduce waste, ensuring that water resources are utilized effectively.

For example, golf courses are notorious for wasting water, as maintaining all that grass and greenery takes a bundle. The average course uses 93,750 gallons daily, enough to fill the average swimming pool nearly four times.

Landscaping, in general, contributes to water waste — but designing layouts with efficiency in mind makes a difference. For example, a drip system is far more efficient than watering gardens with a hose.

Pondless fountains can create striking water features while using far fewer gallons than traditional artificial lakes. Xeriscaping utilizes native plants instead of grass, reducing water use and maintenance needs while cutting lawnmower emissions.

6 Ways Individuals Can Improve Water Efficiency

You want to do your part to improve water efficiency and reduce waste. Here are six techniques, including those renters and those with low incomes can do to conserve this precious resource.

1. Turn Off the Tap

Do you stand in front of the mirror with the faucet running while you brush your teeth or shave? Do you keep the stream flowing while you wash dishes? If so, you’re wasting water.

You can save nearly 5,700 gallons annually by shutting off the faucet while brushing your teeth or shaving. Turning it off between rinses saves another 5,700 gallons yearly if you hand-wash dishes. You don’t only conserve a vital resource — you trim your bill.

Furthermore, while it can be tough to get in the habit if you live alone and are accustomed to washing your plate right after eating, you should use that newer dishwasher in your apartment. Doing so uses only 3-4 gallons, compared to 27 for hand washing — assuming you have sufficient dishware to fill the device4.

2. Use a Timer

Even if you don’t use one every time, a timer can alert you to shower habits that decrease your water efficiency. Yes, sometimes it feels heavenly to let the spray cascade over you, and it might be your only safe spot in the house to cry — exercise self-compassion when you need it.

However, you can save at least 5 gallons, possibly more, by shortening your daily shower. Approach this task scientifically and make it a fun game. First, set a timer starting the moment you turn on the tap and ending when you shut it off to discover how long your showers typically take. Then, challenge yourself to shave off a minute each time — can you get down to under five?

3. Upgrade Your Appliances

Even older dishwashers use fewer gallons of water than hand washing, but the most up-to-date models save the most. Another appliance few people consider is their water heater.

Upgrading to an Energy Star model improves energy and water efficiency. Furthermore, those featuring a recirculation pump reduce how long it takes water to get warm at the fixture and come on both tank and tankless models to reduce what you send down the drain.

4. Go Low-Flow

Upgrading your fixtures when it’s time to renovate also matters to water efficiency—and your wallet. Retrofitting with WaterSense-labeled toilets and sinks could save you up to $380 annually.

What if you rent and have zero say over what’s in your apartment? There’s finally an environmentally positive use for that empty plastic water bottle. Find a 16-ounce version and add it to your tank to reduce how much goes down the drain with each flush.

5. Collect Rainwater

Rainwater collection systems are easy for even novice DIYers to construct. It’s essentially a series of connected PVC pipes that attach to your gutter’s storm drain and flow into barrels. You might even get away with one on your landlord’s property, as it’s simple enough to deconstruct when you move.

Using collected rainwater to flush a toilet can save up to 6 gallons. Many people, however, use it to maintain their landscaping. Although it takes a bit more DIY savvy, attaching a solar-powered drip system to your rainwater collection can create a gorgeous outdoor space that doesn’t waste water or create emissions. How cool is that?

Here is a video from Sensible Prepper showcasing an easy, practical rain catchment system

6. Audit Your Home for Leaks

Address a plumbing leak as soon as you notice it. However, not all leaks are visible. One way to audit your home is to shut off your water main and watch the indicator to see if it moves. If it does, you have trouble somewhere.

Test your toilet by putting a few drops of food coloring in the tank. If it flows into the bowl, you have an issue with your flapper. If you must call a plumber, ask them about installing a leak detector to alert you to problems and protect your home.

4 Ways for Communities to Reduce Water Waste

Your community can also make strides in reducing water waste. Knowing what’s possible makes you a more effective advocate. Attend meetings and offer support for the following innovations.

1. Recycle Grey Water

Individual homeowners can use recycled grey water on their landscaping — but doing so at the community level is more feasible. Grey water refers to what goes down household drains separate from sewage.

It may contain fats, oils, chemicals, and other contaminants, making it unsafe for drinking. Your community must obtain the required permits but can reclaim, treat and use it for purposes like maintaining community outdoor spaces.

2. Xeriscape

Xeriscaping on a community scale reduces water use. Using native plants is also one way to encourage pollinators like butterflies and bees. These critters play a crucial role in the food supply, and an abundance of them keeps community gardens growing strong.

Finally, it reduces maintenance needs. Who likes awakening every Saturday to the clamor of countless lawnmowers?

In areas requiring irrigation, such as golf courses or dog parks, communities can plant drought-resistant grasses like buffalograss, zoysiagrass, and saltgrass, which require little water and few pesticides.

Additionally, they can invest in state-of-the-art irrigation systems that harness AI and sensors to distribute the right amount of water where needed, conserving the rest.

3. Retrofit Government and Public Buildings

Restoring old government and public buildings preserves history, but retrofitting appliances and fixtures makes their use feasible for current times. When performing renovations, selecting the most energy—and water-efficient models should take priority.

Additionally, such facilities can explore technologies such as rainwater harvesting systems paired with greywater recycling to conserve water use.

4. Educate the Community and Provide Incentives

Community leaders can increase awareness. One inexpensive measure is to hang posters regarding wise water use in public restrooms. Additionally, local water authorities can include informational brochures—printed or electronic—in mass communications to customers.

On a larger scale, communities can provide informational tables about water conservation at local events. When selecting bids for construction projects, they can give preference to the firm with the most water-efficient design for the new structure.

Doing so encourages local business leaders to do their part and might result in an otherwise overlooked small business winning a valuable opportunity to show what they can do.

References

National Geographic Society: https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/earths-fresh-water/

Council on Foreign Relations: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/how-us-water-infrastructure-works

EPA: https://www.epa.gov/watersense

The Spruce: https://www.thespruce.com/does-using-a-dishwasher-actually-save-water-5218699/

Angi: https://www.angi.com/articles/how-find-leak.htm