1a

The water supply of my hometown of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania is divided into two different sources. Part of my town where I live, the Hanover Township section, gets their water from the PA American Water company through pipes in the ground or the sewer system. The PA American Water Company services about 650,000 water customers with approximately 400 communities in over 36 counties. The other part of town, the Warrior Run Township section, gets their water from a well set up by the PA American Water Company. The well is under ground and produces water from rain and ground water through a series of filters, pumps and aquifers. The water leaving the houses from bath tubs, sinks, toilets and all drains goes to the water treatment facility run by the WVSA which stands for the Wyoming Valley Sanitary Authority. This is located near the Susquehanna River and applies for both residents with pipes and residents with the well system.

1b

Water usage for February 8, 2016 (Monday):

• 1 Shower @ 10 minutes = 38 gallons
• 4x Toilet flushes = 20 gallons
• 2x Brush teeth = 2 gallons
• 3x Face wash = 3 gallons
• 1x Dishwasher = 20 gallons
• Cooking = 1 gallon
• Drinking = 1 gallon

Total =                                     85 gallons per day

1c

After calculating how much water I use per day, it was very clear that living on two gallons of water per day would be near impossible. Taking a shower by using soap first and then turning the water on to get the soap off seemed to work at first, but eventually you realize that leaving the shower on for more than 30 seconds you are already wasting water. This is very contradictory to my 10 minute showers. Brushing my teeth and washing my face was cut down more easily by using mouthwash and a more liquid soap that doesn’t need as much water to remove like a normal bar of soap does, so you can just wipe it off your face. The cooking and drinking water is where I had the most trouble. I normally drink 1 gallon of water a day to stay hydrated. That is equivalent to about 7 or 8 water bottles which is more than normal people probably drink in one day. It was probably the easiest to cut back on only drinking 3 water bottles or less than half a gallon, but it was the hardest for me to handle because of how much water I am used to drinking. I would say that I am very fortunate to live in a place where my Geography allows me to use more than 2 gallons of water a day. I am aware that not all regions of the world are as lucky as I am and I will be thinking about that every time I take more than a 2 minute shower. This was a very eye opening experience that should teach everyone that water is something precious that should not be wasted. That being said, I have to admit that I 100% failed the experiment of using 2 gallons of water per day.