WATER: Waste versus Efficiency
- By: Ken Nunes
“The key to water efficiency is reducing waste, not restricting use.”. This is the first declaration of the UK’s Not for Profit Organisation Water Wise - About Us.
FirstLook™ would wish to slightly alter the statement to read: The key to water efficiency is ELIMINATING waste, not restricting use.
The onus is however on us to understand the difference between waste and efficiency. This implies understanding the detail of our consumption and our consumptions patterns, which in turn requires information, which of course requires investment (a scarce commodity in our schools).
There comes a point however, where we simply cannot afford not to invest. After all, we are (someone is) paying the cost of supporting waste. Would it not be better to invest in eliminating waste, rather than pay the high cost to continue supporting the waste?
Waste can be divided into two categories:
1. That which we can see – such as dripping taps, running cisterns, broken hose pipes, etc.
2. That which we cannot see – such as an underground leak.
Of course, there are easy solutions to resolve both these problems, although we need some determination to get the process started.
With the elimination of waste, the task of efficiency becomes easier to deal with, as the scale of the problem is within our control.
Yes it requires much more thought, determination and certainly more investment. However, having eliminated waste, financing efficiency becomes easily affordable...