Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
INFORMATION SOURCES
Plenty of free information on water and water issues is only a click
away. A good starting point is the USGS's Water Science Center. To
fi nd information for your state, visit http://www.usgs.gov/state/.
Alternatively, check out the EPA's Local Drinking Water Information
site, http://epa.gov/safewater/dwinfo/index.html, and click on your
state.
Most states also have water-specifi c web sites.
The EPA even has a WaterSense program that promotes water
savings via specially labeled water-effi cient products (http://epa.gov/
watersense/). WaterSense-labeled faucets, for example, are 30 percent
more effi cient than the standard bathroom faucet. Translation: the
average family could save nearly 600 gallons of water a year, enough
to do 10 loads of laundry. Water savings save you cash, too. If every
household in the United States installed water-effi cient appliances,
the country would save more than 3 trillion gallons of water and more
than $18 billion dollars per year, EPA WaterSense estimates.
Here are some more WaterSense suggestions:
Turning off the tap while brushing your teeth can save eight
gallons of water a day, or almost 3,000 gallons a year.
Allowing the faucet to run while washing or shaving is a big
waster of energy, and that energy takes water to produce.
Running the faucet for five minutes uses about as much
energy as operating a 60-watt light bulb for 14 hours!
Urban and regional planner Daniel Williams suggests a new, and
what he calls “conservative,” approach to our nation and its water:
“'Radical' is putting up a huge concrete embankment to stop
a river that's half the size of our continent. 'Conservative' means
to look at things as they are and fi gure out how to work with
