How to Improve YOUR Water Footprint and Help Save our Planet!
Sep 11, 2024
Culligan ZeroWater is here to show you how improving your water footprint can help save our planet! So, if you are searching for ways to be more sustainable and help the environment, read this article! As famous teen climate change activist Greta Thurnberg powerfully stated at the UN Climate Summit, New York, 23 September 2019 "the eyes of all future generations are upon you.”
It is our responsibility in this crucial time that we all do what we can to help save the environment through sustainability, for the sake of our future generations! The main way you can change your water lifestyle choice in order to help the environment is by improving your water footprint.
Indeed, water is necessary to sustaining life on Earth.
Precipitation, evaporation, freezing and melting and condensation are all part of the hydrological cycle – watch this helpful video to learn more about the process of the earth’s water cycle. There is a never-ending global process of water circulation from clouds to land, to the ocean, and back to the clouds.
As stated in the National Research Council's report on Research Pathways for the Next Decade (NRC, 1999): "Water is at the heart of both the causes and effects of climate change."
It is our responsibility to ensure our water supply on earth is not polluted and that improve our water footprint to help the environment.
What is Our Water Footprint?
A water footprint the amount of fresh water utilised or consumed in the production or supply of the goods and services used by a particular person or group. This water consumption can be categorised into direct and indirect:
- Direct water footprint (the type of water footprint this article will focus on) is the amount of water used directly by the individual(s).
- Indirect water footprint represents the summation of the water footprints of all the products consumed. Water is indirectly used in the production of all goods such as food or clothes as well directly, as in your home for cooking, cleaning, bathing or drinking.
The average person in Britain uses about 150 Litres of water every day!
- 30% = flushing the toilet
- 21% = laundry
- 13% = personal hygiene or washing
- 8% = washing up after meals
- 4% = drinking
- 7% = outdoor activities such as watering plants
- 19% = miscellaneous other uses around the home and places of work.
How can You Decrease Your Families Water Footprint?
In Your home:
- Install a smart water meter that will take hourly, automatic readings of your water use. This will give you control and an understanding of your household’s water consumption as well as saving you money in the long run as you’ll spend less money on your water bills.
- Install water saving toilets that use less water when flushing.
- Applying a water-saving showerhead to reduce your water consumption while showering.
- Shower instead of taking regular baths as baths waste so much more water than showers.
- Avoid leaving the water running while brushing your teeth.
- Only run full loads of laundry and dishes
- Fix leaky taps to reduce water loss
- Invest in a water filter so you can get the purest tasting water while also reducing your water footprint without damaging the environment.
In the garden:
- Use a watering can rather than hose to water your plants
- Install a water butt to catch rain water
In Your fridge:
- Animal products have a much higher footprint than fruit, vegetables, grains, etc. Cutting down your consumption of meat and other animal products like cheese is a great way to reduce your water footprint.
- White meat has a much lower footprint than red meat, so ditch beef for chicken.
- Only buy what you can eat: throwing perfectly good food away is a huge waste of water, so making a shopping list and stick to it.
In Your wardrobe:
- Just one cotton t-shirt can require 2,700 litres of water! Fast fashion means that we are buying more clothes than ever before, and we need to nip this habit in the bud.
- Buy second-hand or sustainably produced clothes in order to reduce your water footprint.
Why is It Important to Decrease Your Water Footprint?
By learning about and then decreasing your own personal water footprint you will help to achieve a more sustainable and equitable use of fresh water that will aid not only the environment but your fellow humans. Uncontaminated freshwater is a scarce and ever diminishing resource in some parts of the world - its annual availability is limited. Yet the population continues to increase and thus demand for water is perpetually growing. The water footprint of humanity has surpassed sustainable levels at several places and is unequally distributed among the population. There many places in the world where damaging water depletion or pollution is taking place. Rivers are running dry, thus decreasing lake and groundwater levels. Consequently, many species of wildlife are becoming endangered. This also impacts human lie as water is becoming more and more contaminated or scarce. Professor Arjen Y. Hoekstra, creator of the water footprint concept states that: “the interest in the water footprint is rooted in the recognition that human impacts on freshwater systems can ultimately be linked to human consumption, and that issues like water shortages and pollution can be better understood and addressed by considering production and supply chains as a whole.” Professor Hoekstra further states that “consumers, governments, businesses and civil society communities can all play a role in achieving a better management of water resources.” We must all work together in order to create a more sustainable future.
Investing in a Culligan ZeroWater filter is to invest in a sustainable future for you and our planet!Culligan ZeroWater is here to help YOU save the planet.
Our Premium 5-Stage Ion Exchange Water Filtration System will aid you in reducing your water footprint and prevent you from buying harmful single use plastic. It will also provide you with the purest tasting water free from contaminants. When tested in accordance with the NSF's protocol based on a 40 gallon filtration (double the rated usage), Culligan ZeroWater reduces 97% of Lead and 99.9% of Chromium from your tap water. They are third party tested to reduce 96% of Mercury, 99% of Uranium, 93% of Arsenic and 99% of Copper, among many other contaminants. Therefore, our filters outperform any standard 2-Stage filter on the market such as Brita Filters which are only able remove around half of all dissolved solids! Whereas our advanced filters guarantee to drastically reduce the amount of ‘Total Dissolved Solids’ and contaminants in your water! Take a look at our previous article for a detailed outline on how our Premium 5 Stage Ion Exchange water filters work! You can even verify the effectiveness of your water filter as we provide a free water quality meter which will show the amount of containments reduced by our filters.
