Drought. It is a scary word, even if you aren’t a farmer. The lack of available water impacts everyone’s lives in a very negative way. Some people feel the pain of not having a lush, green lawn; others hate that they can’t wash their car. When water issues start impacting businesses, drought costs everyone money.
Monitor the Groundwater
Groundwater is an amazing, renewable resource. It’s a little bit like a savings account. You can’t keep taking out money once it is gone; the same can be said of groundwater. However, it is a slowly renewable resource. It takes time to refill aquifers and other groundwater stores. The best way to make sure that the groundwater is available for some time is to check the levels. Make sure you aren’t using more of it than is going back in. Once you are aware of the groundwater levels, you can adjust usage to keep the level where it needs to be.
Conserve Water Usage
You can change how you use water in lots of low-tech ways. Turn off the sink while you are brushing your teeth. Don’t run the dishwasher when it isn’t full. Use a broom to sweep off your sidewalk instead of the hose.
There are fun technical innovations that will help you waste less water, also. The good news is that you can actually save money with most of them. Because showering uses less water than taking a bath, you can assume you will save money doing so. You can save even more water and money by using a low-flow shower head or an innovative new development that doesn’t allow hot water to be wasted. By stopping the waste of one minute of shower water, you can save an average of 50 gallons of water. Imagine the savings on the energy it takes to heat the water, as well as the water itself.
Invest in Water Treatment
All water that will be ingested has to be treated somehow. Regular drinking water in major municipalities passes through a water treatment plant. Used water is also processed in a water treatment plant. The plants that take care of water, fresh and the not-so-fresh, always require technology. The technology used to treat water is ever-changing and improving.
One exciting water treatment technology is desalination. Desalination is the process in which the salt is removed from seawater. The result is fresh water which can be used in agriculture, manufacturing, and even to drink. This technology is used in over 7,500 desalination plants worldwide, with the majority being found in the Middle East. It looks like desalination will grow an amazing 9.5 percent annually for the upcoming decade; it could reach 54 billion cubic meters by 2020.