How Much Water Do We Really Use?
Canada is blessed with a bounty of water. However, we may be using more than we really need. But with millions of lakes, access to the , Hudson's Bay and many more fresh water sources, us Canadians seem to believe we can use as much water as we want. Canadians are worldwide known water wasters. The United State is the only country that uses more water than Canada.
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The average Canadian uses 274 liters of water PER DAY. A ridiculous amount of water used considering our population size and that there are 748 million people around the world that lack access to drinking water. So why do we waste so much water? One of the answers is because we are simply uneducated when it comes to our water. We hardly notice water at all. Results of RBC's 2014 Canadian Water Attitudes Survey showed that more than 40 per cent of water users are unaware of the water supply, sewage, and stormwater systems servicing their home. It seems Canadians only take notice when there are water related deaths or destruction.
Our daily water footprint is a lot larger than we think when we take into consideration how much water it takes to make the foods we eat. Producing food uses thousands of liters of water. To produce just one kilogram of beef requires 15 400 liters of water. If each family were to replace eating beef with chicken, they would reduce their water use to 900 000 liters a year. That's a huge difference made by just changing the way you eat.
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Water wastage in our homes is a big issue. Out of the 274 liters of residential water we use daily, 30% is just flushing the toilet. The average person uses the bathroom 5 times a day which means that flushing the toilet once uses 16 liters of water. Leaving the tap running is/having baths is the second biggest wastage of water in the home. 21% of our daily 274 liters of water is wasted by just by filling a bathtub and leaving the tap running. If we were to turn the tap off while we brush our teeth, we could save up to 30 liters of water daily.