I live in California’s wonderful Central Coast but with that is the problem of California’s drought and rapidly depleting watersheds. The water source in my area through Atascadero Mutual Water Company comes from really two different sources, the deep well and the shallow well. The deep well is from the deep water basin and the shallow well comes from the underflow of what is left of the mostly dry Salinas River. The water is then treated with chlorine at the Nacimiento Water Project and distributed throughout homes in the northern part of San Luis Obispo County. As the grey and black water leaves the homes into the sewage systems it is then transferred to the Atascadero Water Reclamation Facility (WRF) where through a series of polishing lagoons and percolation ponds it is then transferred to numerous water sources, for example the man-made Santa Margarita Lake, Salinas River, and aquifers. Notably being right next to the Chalk River Golf Course, the irrigation and watering for the golf course uses a water table almost exclusively compromised of reclaimed water, so I will not be taking up golfing there anytime soon. That however is really only half of my water source, if you account for the number of hours a person spends at work, and the forty plus hours I tend to spend there I wanted to take that water source into account. Like I have previously mentioned I work at the Topaz Solar farm, located in the Carissa Plains, which is about thirty miles out from any sort of tradition water system.  The site which exclusively works on a well with installed reverse osmosis unit from the one hundred and fifty foot well. The water is then distributed to our fire tank (used for fire extinguishing) and the building bathrooms and kitchen. From there it is transferred to the leech field and then from there drains back to the watershed. The majority of the county being an interesting mix of suburban and rural actually works off of wells, especially due to the number of farms and vineyards in the county.

While trying to keep track of my own water usage I did not want to be overly considerate to the activity. I used the water usage calculator that was referenced from my local water company to put together the following list. (1)

• Morning and Night Shower – 8 minutes- 35.2 Gallons
• Brushing Teeth morning and night – 2 minutes of water each- 5.2 Gallons
• Coffee Pot- 0.15 Gallons, 2 times in the day- 0.3 gallons
• Toilet Flushing- 2.07 Gallons – 3 times – 6.42 gallons
• Bottled water at work- 9 bottles in a 10 hour work day in the Carissa Plains on a very warm day- 500ml each coverts to 0.132 gallons- 1.188 Gallons
• Nalgene Bottle at home- 1000 ml- .264 Gallons
• Dishwasher- 9.3 Gallons

All together I used 58 gallons. This is ignoring some intrinsic losses for example, the losses associated with Reverse Osmosis unit at work, which based on my work with RO units in the Navy you get about 30 percent of what you put into it and given the low TDS content from out output and the High TDS from the areas water, that seems accurate. Basically water usage at work with the RO units has losses already built into it, but may be over thinking because brine is returned to the watershed.

For trying to live off of 2 gallons of water was too much of an undertaking for my current job. It is very active and as shown in the list, I drink a lot of water at work out of necessity. That is driven by the fact that I work in the desert and can be relatively active while out in the solar fields with high irradiance and little to no shade cover. Also based on the fact that I am in an active work environment and it can get relatively muddy, dusty, or generally dirty because of work with oils, hazmat, or lubricants I would not be allowed to work without showering. The shower, as rated by the Atascadero Water Mutual site links is rated at about 2.2 gallons per minute, so that becomes tough to accomplish as well. However by showering the night before I was slightly able to cheat that, except it was an exceptionally busy day at work and I needed to shower. Things I was able to cut out of the total overall were fairly small, I removed luxury items like coffee, cut back on leaving the faucet running while brushing my teeth down to estimated 20 seconds. I hand washed my dish at lunch vice letting my dishes fall in to the collective after lunch dishwasher cycle our admin likes to do and only ran the faucet for 30 seconds. As far as toilet flushes go, I used the portable toilets in the field, so that was able to count, but sort of a cheat and not a sustainable method. Overall it was not a successful test, methods used are situational and my job and position do not allow for the kinds of sacrifices that would need to be made to be able to perform my job properly.

Overall, geography very specifically attribute to the amount of water accessible and the amount of water necessary. California’s drought driven by the lacking snow pack in the mountains and the minuscule rain we have gotten over the past decade without an El Nino has driven the county and state to invoke policies regarding water usage. San Luis Obispo County is in a strange position with a bustling farm and wine community and a drought fighting side by side. While the cities in north county are passing legislation on the control of well water by farms, most of the lakes in the county being dried up, the rivers run near dry, and the aquifers almost completely gone, California’s Central Coast and its many microclimates are an excellent example of how geography can affect water use.

1. “House Water Saver,” Accessed on Feb 8th 2016,  http://www.h2ouse.org/tour/index.cfm
2. “Water Treatment Plant,” City of Atascadero, Last modified Feb 6th 2016 http://www.atascadero.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=644&Itemid=1666
3. “Water Supply,” Atascadero Mutual Water Company, Accessed on 7 Feb 2016 http://www.amwc.us/WaterSupply.asp?sm=f