Water Restrictions and Me.

This is not, as some of you may expect a rant about how much I hate water restrictions. I do not, as a general rule, use all that much water. There are only two people living in my house (plus a small dog), how much water can two showers 4 toilet flushes and a couple of minutes of hand/face washing take up?

I know there is more water usage than that (cooking, cleaning, washing, etc), but the point is that the water restrictions that we are under at the moment do not really affect my way of life.

For those that do not know, NSW, Australia is in a pretty bad water shortage at the moment. There were reports of people paying $18,000 for a single truckload of water for their farms. They would, normally, I believe, pay about 10% of that. Our major metropolitan supply dam is at about 60% capacity, and once it gets down to 55% (other Sydney dopers please feel free to correct me on any factual points) water restrictions become mandatory. At the moment, we are under “self regulating” water restrictions. I was reading the other day (sorry, no cite) that the average Sydney home uses 900l of water a day. That seems a little high to me, but I guess when you have 4 kids and two adults, all of whom need showers… but that is just a ridiculous amount when you add every home in the Sydney area. There has got to be nearly a million homes (or more, I honestly do not know).

So the NSW govt. has introduced these water guidlines. No sprinklers or anything like that between 8 and 8, and various other “ideas” that will help us conserve water that is very greatly needed for the firefighters at the moment, and for general use at other times.

Last night while I was walking my (small) dog, approximately 1/3 of the people on our street were out watering their yards! Do they think that the water supply AFTER 8pm comes from a special water-tree or some shit? Most of them also looked like they were trying to be as covert as possible, moving slowly, trying not to be seen. Many looked as though they knew they were doing something wrong, but it did not stop them spilling hundreds of litres into the street, and down the drains. And that’s just from one street. I imagine the dopey fuckers were doing that all over the city.

But it does not stop there… people are still washing their cars on the street as well! I can understand that many people like to have clean cars. My car was washed November 16th, and that was only because I needed a car to get me to my wedding the following afternoon. I think a clean car for that was OK, but we then drove to Dubbo, and my normally dark green car came back more than half white, from the dust on the roads. It’s still there, waiting for the rain to wash it off :slight_smile:

I was talking to my neighbour the other day, and she said that “I hate washing my car in water restrictions, but I’m going to <insert place name here>.”

Because they don’t let people with dirty cars in there anymore? What the fuck kind of excuse is that? I am sorry if this is a pretty weak Pit thread, but for fucks sake people, how important can green grass really be? You people are the same ones that will complain the loudest when the water restrictions are more easily enforceable.

Having said that, I do not think that there should not be some exclusions to water restrictions. Places that need water to look after animals, hospitals, places like that should be able to use as much water as they need. I am not even opposed to “public” places such as museums, and parliament house (for example) using the water, as they do need to keep up appearances. But why do we need to use sprinklers on football fields that are only in use between March and September?! (Oh for an interrobang right here). If a council area’s parks are a little brown, do they get kicked out of the club, and become outcast nations with no-one to guide them? Why do we need to hose down pedestrian malls, or the footpath outside a shop? Have we as a collective nation forgotten how to use a fucking BROOM for getting rid of leaves?

And do not get me started on people who need to have 2 inch deep dark green grass for their own sense of self worth? I don’t give a fuck about your orchids, or your rare hungarian butterfly eating plant. Do you think in this heat my dog would not like to be running under a sprinkler in the back yard? I am sure she would love that, but it’s not going to happen. She gets her two large bowls of fresh water every morning, and that’s enough for her to make it until the night, when she gets the water refreshed. (At the moment, her bowls are filling with ash from the bushfires, so we refresh them alot more often)

You’re all fucking assholes, and I’d like to punch each of you in the face personally.

The idea is that you lose less to evaporation at night. And I expect many parks use reaclaimed water, they certainly do down here.

Amen to that! I live in the US now, but i’ve lived most of my life in Sydney, and nothing used to piss me off more than people using their hoses to wash the leaves off the footpaths in front of their houses. Not only is it a waste of water, but the sort of people who do this also fail to discriminate between leaves and other rubbish, so they also wash away paper, plastic bags, etc., all of which end up down the drains and then in the ocean.

Either that, or these people would just direct the leaves ten metres down the footpath, so they were in front of someone else’s house. Hello? Idiots? Sweep the stuff into a pile, pick it up, and put it in a bin (rubbish) and or composter (leaves) if you have one.

I’m with you again. The best part is the way that some of these lawn nazis talk about their sense of personal pride and civic responsibility, as evidenced by their willingness to waste thousands of litres of water and pour twenty-six varieties of toxic chemicals (herbicides, pesticides, etc. etc.) onto their beloved swathe of suburban greenery.

For those who need to keep their cars clean (company car, job presentation factors, etc…) please check out your local car wash. AFAIK, almost all of them have between 90-99% of the water recycled.

A lot of council parks use recycled water to water the gardens (e.g, Botanic Gardens). I think anyone who uses a sprinkler to water their lawn during water shortages should have their water cut off for a day. :stuck_out_tongue:

You should have seen the people around here watering their lawns “so they look nice for Christmas” in the middle of last week’s bushfires.

There’s almost no domestic use of “grey” water in the Sydney metropolitan area, and even though industrial use of water is far higher than domestic use, us householders still use WAY too much water.

The fines for violating water restrictions are pitiful, and I - for one - would like to see a water flow restrictor placed on the meter of anyone caught violating them, with the period of restricted flow increasing with each subsequent offence.

There are still many homes in the fire-affected areas without water or power - it’s hard to believe how selfish some people can be. They think that because they pay for their water consumption they have a right to use an unlimited amount of the resource.

On another note, did anyone catch the last Channel 10 News update. Some asshats have destroyed 3 firefighting helicopters at South Grafton airport.

I am no environmentalist, let me get that straight out, and I do not as yet own my own home. But how much trouble is it really to get a damn water tank? I understand that lots of inner city yards are VERY small, so it may not be feasible, but surely there is somewhere that can be used to store water for the lawn.

It’s also expensive to re-do a laundry to put aside the water from the washing machine for that use, but why is it not a fairly standard thing in new homes? It cannot cost that much to add to a new house, even if we cannot retro-fit it to all installations.

Also, just to add some official numbers, I grabbed this snippet from the Sydney Morning Herald.

So my previous estimate was actually a little lower than the final figures.

I was also horrified by the lack of acceptance of Sydney Water’s offers recently. They were offering a new shower head, as well as new kitchen tap water regulators for some stupidly low cost. Not one person that I know took them up on the offer. Our landlord (private rental) actually said “I don’t want you to do that, I don’t trust the workers”. He says this, and then continues to make sure his lawns are green, and his plants are watered.

It’s not hard to change little things, the laziness of people, and their unwillingness to change even slightly for the greater good sickens me still.

Wouldn’t watered lawns cut down the risk of more fires? I know they don’t outright forbid watering lawns here even when we have 30 days of 100+ degree F weather and no rain in sight. They do give us a restricted watering schedule and tell us to water in the evening or in the early morning (evening is better) to prevent evaporation. You can tell a newcomer to the Texas heat because they’re watering their lawns in the daytime.

A couple of points Khadro. Many councils in the Sydney metropolitan area will not allow you to install rainwater tanks, just as they won’t allow you to use “grey” water (water from bathing or laundry) for watering the lawn, etc.

It was common up until about 10 years ago for washing machines to have a “suds saver” cycle, which allowed you to wash several loads of washing in the same water - something our mothers did for years before the advent of fully automatic washing machines. Presumably this option disappeared because consumers didn’t want a feature which involved them having to be physically present at various points of the laundry cycle.

What’s really horrifying is that Sydney’s October water consumption was the highest on record - despite people knowing we’re in a drought and facing water restrictions.

To be honest, we learned to appreciate water a few years ago when we had to buy bottled water and boil water because of cryptospiridium contaminating the water supply - we need that same kind of reminder of just how precious a resource it is again. Sadly, I suspect that we’ll get it only when we get bushfire which are bad enough to shut down the metropolitan water supply.

Reprise, I do not wish you to think that I am stalking you, but I happened to be looking at other threads when the email saying I had a response came, so I checked it out. I am not waiting for you to post particularly.

Or am I?

I did not know there were restrictions on water tanks and grey water. I remember reading in the paper a few weeks ago that the State Govt was trying to convince people to use them. There was some excited talk about one politician drinking rain water, despite claims that it was non potable… and I very quickly ignored it as another of the Telegraphs sensationalist pieces of fluff. But if there are laws that say you cannot have a water tank, then I guess those people are off the hook. :slight_smile:

I can understand it from some points though, as it would mean it would be necessary to use low phosphate laundry powders etc, and that would be much harder to educate people on than simply saying “use ‘real’ water, but not as much of it”. People seem to latch on to the first part real well, but the second part must always be said in whispers, because not many people pay attention to it.

We’re allowed water tanks up here and once I manage to save up the cost ($500 – $1500) I’m getting one. Not that a rainwater tank is of any use whatsoever when it doesn’t rain.

I’m judiciously watering trees which will die if I don’t but I’m mostly using grey water I am bucketing to the trees. the garden is mulched as much as I could get on there which is making a huge difference.I love my neighbours so freaking much when they are watering their concrete – what do they think it’s gonna grow or something?

If you were talking about the spread of a normal suburban house fire from one property to the next, then a well-watered, green lawn might slow down the progress of the fire a little.

In this case, though, we’re talking about firestorms, and little short of “scorched earth” hazard reduction programmes will impede their progress. To quote one senior fire chief this morning “the only way we could have prevented these fires would be to turn the whole of New South Wales into a moonscape”.

Many types of lawns are capable of going dormant and reviving once rains return. It doesn’t work that way for other kinds of plants, which go dry and die.

It might be worthwhile forgoing a shower or two so that a rare orchid collection could live.
Unless of course you had the seat on the bus next to me.