Water Conservation Exercise

Determine the flow rate of a faucet that you regularly use (kitchen sink, bathroom sink, shower) by collecting water in a container of known volume and tracking how many seconds it takes to fill the container. Repeat 3 times (or more), and calculate an average.

Convert your data to liters per minute AND gallons per minute. For example, if your container is 1 liter, and it took an average of 10 seconds to fill, you would perform the following calculation to get liters per minute:

1 liter / 10 seconds *60 seconds / minute = 6 liters / minute

To get gallons, you would use the following conversion:

1 liter = .264 gallons

6 liters/minute *.264 gallons/liter = 1.584 gallons / minute

Track how many minutes you use that faucet over the course of two days. Take an average of those two days to get your average water per use day at that one faucet.

Given the flow rate, report how much volume of water (in both liters and gallons) would you currently use PER YEAR at that one faucet (assuming you lived in the same place for all 365 days)? Consider how you might change your behavior to reduce the amount of water you use from that faucet.

Considering all the other ways you use water in your daily life, how do you think you compare to the average Floridian (who uses ~150 gallons of water per day).

Write this up and share on the Discussion Board before class on Tuesday, October 6. You can receive up to 10 points for your answers, as well as 2.5 points for responding to another student’s posting.