National And Local Water Use In The Us

National and Local Water Use in the U.S.

Purpose: To use the Internet to gather and interpret water use data, water use maps, GIS maps, weather and climate maps in order determine water use trends in the United States.

Answer questions on a separate sheet of paper.

Part I National Water Use Data Go to the website below to access the data set Total water use in U.S. from 2000 data sets: http://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/2004/circ1268/htdocs/table01.html

1. Calculate the per capita water use of Montana, California, Florida, Colorado, Ohio, New York, Arizona, Kansas, Louisiana, and Maine. (Be careful of the units)

2. How does the population of a state compare to the per capita water usage in general?

3. List three reasons why some of the states are such high per capita water users.

4. Which are the 3 most populated states, and how much total water does each state use?

5. Which are the 3 least populated states, and how much total water does each state use?

Part II Ground water and Surface water Utilization Go to the website below for information on groundwater extraction by state: http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/wugw.html

6. Approximately what percent of total water withdrawn in the U.S. was groundwater?

7. How many millions of gallons do the most ground water consumptive states use each day?

8. Which are the top 5 ground water use states, and what percent of national ground water does each consume?

9. What are the 4 major uses of ground water resources?

10. What are some of the ways the ground water is “recharged”?

Go to the website below for information on surface water consumption by state: http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/wusw.html

11. What are some of the major sources for surface water?

12. Which states withdraw between 10-20,000 million gallons of water each day? 13. Which state is the leader in surface water withdraws?

14. What are the 3 main uses of surface water?

15. How might surface water utilization create conflict or competition over water resources?

16. Describe the general trend of surface water withdraws in the United States from 1950-2000.

Part III Climate and Water utilization Click on the Annual Precipitation Map of U.S.: http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/pcpn/us_precip.gif

17. Identify the 5 states you would say have the lowest overall precipitation.

18. Does precipitation correlate to ground and surface water utilization?

19. Why do you think the Southeast region of the country gets so much precipitation?

20. Which three states have areas that receive more than 180 inches of rain annually? What accounts for this? Part IV Local Water Use: Water Loss Drop by Drop

Introduction Leaks in water lines waste an extremely valuable and diminishing resource. New York City’s Department of Environmental Protection estimates that leaks make up about 10% of the water demand of the city. In the last 15 years New York City has examined 31 million feet (5871 mi) of the 33.6 millions feet (6364 mi) of water mains and eliminated 89 million gallons/day in leaks. The Boston Water and Sewer Commission surveyed 819 miles of its 1182 miles of water distribution mains and fixed 427 leaks out of 444 leaks found, saving 7.16 million gallons/day.

Water losses in the developing world are more severe. In Iran in 1997, for example, 30% of the 3.8 billion cubic meters (1 trillion gallons) of treated water for the public was lost. This loss took place in a desert country with a population growing at an annual rate of 1.75%.

It might seem that with such large-scale losses in distribution systems, little domestic leaks are of little consequence. This exercise will show that when minor events occur often and long enough they result in large effects.

Problem The number of people in Howard County in 2005 was 269,457. Assume the average household size is four people and there are approximately five water sources (faucets and toilets) in each household. Assume that two of the faucets leak at the rate of 1 drop/sec.

Always show your set-up and work. Use proper labels.

1. Calculate the volume of water lost by each household annually. Here are some useful equivalences. Explain any other assumptions you make.

20 drops = 1 milliliter 3.78 liters = 1 gallon 1 gallon = 0.5ft3

2a. What is the total water loss in your county?

2b. What percent of the total water consumption does that community loss represent? Assume a typical person uses 95 gallons of water per day, on average.

3. Describe 10 actions you could take in your own home to conserve water. Estimate what percent of your total household consumption your savings represent.