The July Power and Water Report

It’s the last day of JULY and my month devoted to reducing my water and power consumption!!!  Tomorrow, I’ll put up the post that defines my August challenge to reduce my “superfluous web browsing” (in addition to taking a Facebook hiatus).  But before moving to the fresh and new, here’s my end-of-July wrap up.  First, I want to report what I did to reduce my water and power consumption in the rooms that my home tour did not visit.  Then we’ll look at my month-end bathroom water stats to find out how mellow my water yellowed. (I know, eww…)

THE LIVING ROOM AND DESK AREA:

My new baby.

• I bought a new laptop last month, along with an extra, long-running battery.  When fully charged, it can run up to 7 or 8 hours, depending on what I’m using it for (music and video deplete this time greatly).  And it has customizable energy saving settings for the light display on battery versus when plugged in, when to sleep, when to go on standby, etc.  A HUGE improvement to my old 2006 dinosaur.  So I’m only plugging it in when it needs to be charged.  I’ve also been charging my phone exclusively with my computer while I’m working, instead of plugging it into a socket and then forgetting to unplug the charger when I’m done.

My computer's nifty power control settings!

•  I’ve been using a solar powered radio to listen to the radio, versus my stereo.  My stereo, television (which I rarely use anyway), and the lamp by the TV have been turned off and unplugged all month, as has the other lamp in my living room.

Next to radio: USB battery charger!

THE BEDROOM:

• I’ve been trying really hard to be better about turning off the assorted lights in my bedroom and bedroom closet.  I decided to turn off the surge protector that one of my bedside lamps is plugged into for the month, and rely on my closet light and the other bedside lamp. 

• The only other things I use with my bedroom power strip are my hair dryer and my flat iron, which I’ve used once a piece this month (for an interview).  Granted my hair has been pretty fluffy and prone to flipping out this month.  But I don’t think it has totally demolished public opinion of me.

• Because I’m prone to reading in bed at night, I’ve been using my headlamp with rechargeable batteries instead of the lamp.  I also have a hand crank charger with a USB port for my USB battery charger, but I haven’t needed to use it yet.

This photo was taken before No Hair-Dryer July.  Clearly.

And now onto my bathroom water stats!  I'm ridiculously excited to share my July results.  I kept track of my shower times and flushes for 29 days of July (I stayed away from home 2 nights early in the month and forgot to bring my shower timer and tally sheets). And like last month, I didn’t keep track of how many times I flushed public toilets.  (I did flush them.)

THE TOILET

Review of June Home Flush stats:

• Month total: 90 flushes over 25 days
• Daily average: 3.6 flushes
• Water used per flush: 1.6 gallons
• 25-Day Total H2O flushed: 144 gallons (Est. 29-Day Total: 167.04 gallons)
• Avg. H2O flushed per day: 5.76 gallons

July Home Flush stats:

• Month total: 75 flushes over 29 days
• Daily average: 2.59 flushes
• Water used per flush: 1.45 gallons*
• 29-Day Total H2O flushed: 108.75 gallons
• Avg. H2O flushed per day: 3.75 gallons

*Reduced by addition of a 1/2 liter bottle to 1.6 gpf toilet tank, as photographed below.

A few things worth noting:

1. I cut my daily flush average by 28%.
2. I reduced the amount of water I flushed daily by 35%.
3. By subtracting my July 29-Day Total H2O flushed from my June Est. 29-Day H2O flushed total, I saved an estimated 58.29 gallons of water this month.

Not too shabby!

THE SHOWER

I thought I might have showered more this month than last month, but as of writing this blog today, I took 14 showers this month (plus one that I didn’t time while I was away).  This is slightly alarming, because I took three showers over one particularly warm and active weekend….  Remember, my below shower times reflect the amount of time the shower water was running, not the total amount of time I spent in the shower lathering and shaving without the water running. 

• My longest shower: 4 min flat.
• My shortest shower: 1 min 40 sec.  Super fast.
• Monthly Total: 37 min 23 sec  (or 2243 sec)
• Average shower length: 2 min 40 sec.
• My fastest shower in June (4 min 30 sec) was a half a minute longer than my longest shower in July, and almost 3 minutes longer than my fastest shower in July.
• My fastest July shower was almost 10 min 30 sec faster than my longest shower in June.

With that kind of difference, it is no surprise that I cut my shower time by almost 60% this month! 

ALSO: If the shower uses 3 gallons of water per minute, I used 112.14 gallons of water in the shower this month. That’s 162.51 gallons less than I used showering in June.  That’s like another whole month of shower water, and change!

*just* a few hot baths….

And that’s it!  FYI: I won’t be notifying people of posts on Facebook or Twitter this coming month because of the nature of August’s challenge.  But I will be posting roughly once a week.  So be sure to check in now and then, or you could go cRazY and “follow” this blog.  I hope to talk or see lots of you this coming month!