Did you know that there are more than 55,000 water systems in the United States that combined process nearly 34 billion gallons of water per day? How about the fact that 53 percent of the U.S. population uses groundwater? These and other tidbits of information are available from the American Water Works Association.
The AWWA has compiled an interesting "Stats on Tap" document available on its Internet site at http://www.awwa.org. The file provides quite a variety of interesting bits of information about the water industry in the United States. For example, in 1996 approximately 98,000 people were involved in the treatment of drinking water and wastewater. Despite that large work force dedicated to providing clean, safe water, there are approximately 23 million private wells supplying drinking water in the United States.
The large water systems in the U.S. have distribution networks that include about 600,000 miles of pipe. When you count other systems and include Canada, there is approximately 1 million miles of pipelines and aqueducts in North America. That is enough to circle the earth 40 times.
On average, 50 to 70 percent of home water is used outdoors for watering lawns and gardens. However, Americans drink more than 1 billion glasses of tap water per day. That number is actually about half what it should be, when you consider that people should consume eight glasses of water per day and there are 250 million of us in the United States.
According to the AWWA statistics, each person in a single family home uses 74 gallons of water per day on average. Although it's hard to imagine a normal person consuming that much water in one day, keep in mind that includes 20 gallons per day for toilet flushing, more than 12 gallons for showers and 15 gallons for washing clothes. Leaks account for about 10 gallons, while letting the faucet run while doing dishes or getting a glass of water accounts for about 11 gallons per person. If you believe the 1 billion glass figure above, the amount actually drank averages out to only about 32 ounces!
AWWA estimates the average household could reduce daily per capita water use by about 30 percent by installing more efficient water fixtures and regularly checking for leaks. If all U.S. households installed water-saving features, water usage nationwide could decline by 5.4 billion gallons per day, resulting in a savings of $11.3 million per day or more than $4 billion per year.
Although the nation's population has grown over the last two decades, water consumption actually has declined by a few percentage points. Some reasons for the decline are active conservation programs, new technologies requiring less water, higher costs to obtain water, and public awareness of water resource issues.
Today, utilities must regularly test for 103 contaminants. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, nearly 90 percent of today's drinking water exceeds federal standards. That's comforting to know when you consider this chilling fact: In 1900, 25,000 people died from typhoid in the United States alone. Thanks to those 98,000 hardworking souls in the water treatment industry, and a generous dose of chlorine, death by waterborne disease has become relatively rare.
One final, important note from the AWWA Stats file. Half-time during the football game on Thanksgiving Day, 1999: Some 16.4 million Americans head to the restroom, flushing away 48.5 million gallons of water. If they all had efficient toilets, they could have saved 22.3 million gallons of water, enough to fill 1,476 swimming pools!
James Laughlin
Editor
