By Megan Prusynski •
April 17, 2009
With the economy on the downturn, more and more people are starting gardens to help ease grocery bills. Growing one’s own food is a step towards living sustainably, so this is great news. However, more gardens mean more water use, and 40% of water used during the summer is used outdoors. So, as you plan your garden this spring, be sure to keep water in mind and take measures to reduce water usage.
Reducing water usage in an organic garden not only conserves our most precious resource, it also lowers costs and in many cases, benefits the plants as well. By paying attention to how your garden is watered, you can be sure to give plants just the amount of water they need to thrive without overdoing it. Many of the water saving methods mentioned below also benefit the soil and enrich your garden in other ways. Water should be a key part of your garden planning from day one. Read on for ways to garden sustainably and save water.
Editor’s note: This post was written by Jason Pelletier, and originally published at Low Impact Living on March 28, 2009.
If you’re one of those folks out there who is suffering from a bit of carbon fatigue, then a post in the NY Times’ Green Inc. blog this week could either provide additional motivation for green projects or increased fear of another jargon-laden debate. Green Inc highlighted the growing trend of striving for “water neutrality”, as highlighted at the Fifth World Water Forum in Istanbul last week.
The idea is gaining ground within a group of companies looking to understand and reduce their consumption of water, including Coca Cola, whose chairman has pledged to eventually balance out all of the water used in its products and manufacturing processes through conservation elsewhere (over 80 billion gallons worth!).
This got me to thinking: what would it take to be water-neutral in our own homes, meaning that we don’t import any net water? If we include all of the water that goes into our food and the products we consume, then it gets ugly real fast (see this post on the water content of food, for example). But what about our direct water use - showers, irrigation, toilets, etc?
Now, this would require some significant changes to a home and to local building/health/safety codes, since the only way to go water-neutral is to reuse graywater and harvest/store rainwater. Both of these options now face numerous permitting and legal obstacles around the country (including some pretty counterintuitive ones, like Utah and Colorado bans on capturing ANY rainwater at your home). Assuming we could, though, how much rain would it take to provide a family’s annual water needs?
By Becky Striepe •
March 24, 2009
We know to
only run the dishwasher when we have a full load. We also know
that there are lots of great options for Earth-friendly dishwashing detergents. What we don’t always think about though, is good old maintenance. Nothing wastes water like unloading your dishwasher to find you have to wash half or all of the load over by hand. Giving your dishwasher a good Spring cleaning will help your dishes come out free of debris by removing gunk and buildup from all the innards.
