California's Mandatory Water Reductions
On April 1, 2015 Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. announced mandatory water reduction in cities and towns across California to reduce water usage by 25 percent. In 2014 the Governor proclaimed a drought state of emergency after a recording of the lowest snow level in the Sierra Nevada in the last 65 years of record keeping.
So what does this mean and who does it affect? Well, honestly this affects everyone in not only California but the rest of the USA as well. Not only does a significant amount of the countries' produce and beef come from California, this affects all aspects of business done in California, beyond just the obvious in regards to produce and agriculture. Every California resident and business will be affected and will need solutions to their mandatory water reduction. New technology will need to be created to make this water reduction a reality. We will all need to look and create new ideas and technology to reduce the amount of wasted water.
New water reduction technologies:
Waterless Urinals
Waterless Urinals look like a regular urinal. Men use them like a regular urinal but they do not flush them, instead they use gravity for drainage. The outflow pipe then connects to the building's regular plumbing system and the urine is disposed of normally in the water treatment plant. There are different designed by manufacturers some companies use a trap in the drain to stifle the urine odors. The technology is relatively simple the trap or cartridge has a proprietary liquid (an oil of some sort) and the liquid simply floats on the water and the urine sink and all of the gases (or odor) can't rise through the oil.
The technology is not a completely new idea. These waterless urinals can be found in the New York Mets Citi Field Stadium, the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta and the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. The cost benefit is tremendous. Not only are you saving a valuable resource like water, you are saving a tremendous amount of money be eliminating wasted water through flushing. In 2005 the state of Arizona made
waterless urinals
mandatory in all government buildings. The Department of Defense is ordering these waterless urinals to be installed on military bases. I would not be surprised after the current announcement by the Governor of California to see that state follow the same mandate of using waterless urinals.
Falcon Waterfree System offers a simple and effective patented technology to have an odor free waterless urinal. Click here to read more about the technology.
Automatic Faucets:
Another important way to save water in the restroom is to install automatic faucets. These should be mandatory in all public restrooms. These prevent the accidental act of leaving a water faucet on to flow for who knows how long. These faucets save millions if not billions of gallons of wasted water as they cannot be turned on for long amounts of time. People are not reliable to turn off the faucet, these automatic faucets are.
Ameraproducts.com offers several choices for automatic faucets. The first is a simple Auto Spout Adapter. The Palmer AF0630-12 is an automatic faucet attachment which is an easy Do-It-Yourself installation on any standard faucet nozzle. This attachment uses 3"AA" batteries that can last up to a year. This faucet uses a motion-sensor technology that allows water to flow only as long as needed. This technology not only save money and resources but the touch-free technology helps you avoid cross-contamination and germ-spreading.
Another option is the revolutionary Bradley AV30 Advocate that is an all-in-one Lavatory system. This system is completely touchless with an automatic soap dispenser, sink and hand dryer side by side which gives users more personal space and keeps water off the floor, eliminating towel usage. These Advocate systems are sold in systems of one, two or three all-in-one systems. The AV30 (one), AV60 (two), AV90 (three).
In addition to water savings with faucets and waterless urinals - there can be significant water savings reducing the number of paper towels and switching to hand dryers. Hand Dryers can often eliminate the need for paper towels. It is estimated that in order to make 1 ton of paper towels that would require 20,000 gallons of water and 17 trees. This is a significant amount considering the paper towel just goes directly into the trash and there are better ways to dry your hands. Gone are the old inefficient hand dryers of yesterday that we would use and then just "wipe our hands on our pants". The technology of today's hand dryers dry hands quickly, efficiently and most important they are dry - no more dripping hands.
Hand Dryers
Energy Efficient Hand Sanitizing Hand Dryers
American Dryer has a new technology "Cold Plasma Clean CPC which boasts energy efficiency, fast performance, and it sanitizes hands while drying hands. These dryers are a perfect alternative to paper towels. They not only eliminate paper towel waste, reduce water usage by reducing the production of paper towels, they also take up less space about 43% less space than the old "industry standard" high-speed hand dryers. They sanitize and dry hands while purifying the surrounding air suing American Dryer's "Cold Plasma Clean" Technology.
There are several other highly efficient high performance hand dryers on the market. World Dryer has a new hand dryer the SMARTdri that is energy efficient, with an automatic operation that uses 45-65% energy than competitive high speed dryers. This dryer has intelligent, flexible controls that allow customizing air flow, sound quality and heating options to fit your exact application environment. The Machflow hand dryer is one of the fastest and most effective hand dryers on the market - it can dry your hands in 8 to 12 seconds. The Machflow is also one of the greenest dryers on the market using less power and up to 90% less compared to traditional style hand dryers.
There are several studies now that prove that using less paper trash will save water. This not only applies in the restroom, but throughout the office environment. Reduce office paper by using less printed paper. Our office technology today can make an office virtually paperless. We no longer need to print everything in triplicate. We can email and store files electronically thus helping to reduce water usage.
Recycling Saves Water
According to a 2005 US Senate Report these numbers prove that recycling saves water:
Paper:
Newsprint - One ton of recycled newsprint save 7,000 gallons of water, 71 gallons of oil, 10.2 Btu's of energy.
Office Paper - One ton of recycled office paper saves 17 trees and 7,000 gallons of water, 463 gallons of oil, and enough energy to heat an average home for six months.
Plastic - One ton of recycled plastic save 5,774 Kwh of energy, 16 .3 barrels of oil, 98 million Btu's of energy and 30 cubic yards of landfill space.
Glass - One ton of recycled glass saves 42 Kwh of energy, 0.12 barrels of oils - over 30% of the raw materials used in glass now comes from recycled glass.
Aluminum - One ton of recycled aluminum saves 14,000 kilowatt hours of energy, 40 barrels of oil and 238 million Btu's of energy.
Steel - One tone of recycled steel saves 642 Kwh of energy, 1.8 barrels of oil and 10.9 million Btu's of energy. |