Part 1-a

My hometown’s main surface water source is Lake Scranton.  Lake Scranton is maintained by Pennsylvania American Water (PAW) and the treatment facility can process up to a max of 33 million gallons of water per day.  The disposed water is then collected and brought to one of the three sewage treatment centers.  Some more water sources that we draw from in this aria is the Griffin Reservoir  and Summit Lake Reservoir.  These sources supplements the Lake Scranton system through PAW’s alternate water purification facilities.  The water supply is then distributed for residential, commercial, and industrial uses after it goes through the purification facilities.  I guess the closest facility to where I live (that I managed to find information on anyways) is the Throop Treatment plant.  At this plant they have grit removal channels, mechanical bar screens, sequencing batch reactors, belt filter press, UV disinfection channels, sludge thickener, aerobic digesters, primary setting tanks, aeration tanks, clarifiers, chlorine tanks, automated sodium hypo-chlorite feed system,de-chlorination feed system, automated alkalinity/pH feed system, and raw sewage pumps.  The permitted treatment capacity of the Throop treatment plant is 7.0 MGD.

http://www.lrbsa.com/s3.html

http://www.amwater.com/ccr/scranton.pdf

Part 1-b

Water Usage for a day:

1x Shower 15mins = 57g

2x Brushing teeth = 2g

1x Hand washed dishes 10mins = 30g

4x Toilet uses = 20g

4x Faucets (washing hands) = 6g

2x Drinking water = 16oz

1x Shave = 1g

I use about 109.12 gallons per day.

Part 1-c

Trying to live off of 2 gallons of water for a day was a pretty tough challenge.  I understand water is a pretty valuable resource in some countries and having been able to live in Taiwan with my grandfather for a few months I was able to learn that pretty early (though I’ve been spoiled by everyday life).  To be able to do this, I did what we did oversees.  In the morning I’d take one shower/bath. I’d draw about .75 gallons of water to use to wipe myself down and then wash the soap/shampoo off.  I would then use .125 gallons (or 2 cups) of water to prepare rice for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Then next .125 gallons of water is used as my drinking water through out the day.  At the end of the day I started to use .5 gallons of water for cleaning the plates, rice cooker, and the glass I used.  The last .5 gallons was used for brushing my teeth in the morning and at night.  This was definitely a challenging experiment to accomplish, but due to my nature and personality (if I get absorbed into something) I tend to forget about everything around me (ex. hunger).  Geography is definitely an important factor for water use.  Some places around the world just don’t have the water supplies or even the technology to keep their water “usable.”  The location of an area will have dramatic effects on water usage, by either being just a drought/desert or even just cut off from a clean water supply.