Domestic water use is apparently the greatest important use of water for a large number
of people. The domestic water use comprises of water used each and every day in a home house.
These uses include water used for the common household purposes which include bathing, food
preparation, drinking purposes, washing clothes as well as the dishes, watering our gardens and
washing the dishes among others. Domestic water use make up to a total of 10% of the water use
in the world. Various researches on the same have demonstrated that the demand for domestic
water use has been growing overtime. This demand for the domestic water use has been
increasing due to factors such as the increase in the number of the members in household as well
as the increase in the number of activities carried out in the household. An increase in these two
factors can lead to an increase in the demand for the domestic water use. In the process of using
the water, there is the need to reduce the rate of its usage and this plays a very important role in
ensuring the water is preserved. This paper has highlighted the various plans in which New York
has adopted in reduction domestic water uses. The overall demand for water has shown a
reduction in the amount of water used per day in the New York due to the improvements in the
Water Demand Management Plans in constructing water efficiency.
The first plan which New York has implemented so as to ensure the reduction in water
demand is the Municipal Water Efficiency Program. This plan provides financing for the various
water demands reduction projects within the city (Gleick, 2000). This plan has implemented
plants for wastewater treatment which are used for the conservation of water opportunities as
well as launching a yearly challenge for water conservation to the operators of these treatment
plants for the purpose of implementing the best monitoring practices to reduce water
consumptions and uses.
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The second plan that the New York city has developed so as to ensure the reduction in
the daily usage and demand for water is the residential water efficiency program. This plan
continues development of housing on a limited footprint. This heavy residential surrounding
relates to continued domestic water use with the purpose of driving the overall water demand and
consumption (Lee et al., 2011). The residents in the New York city account to 81% of the usage
of the metered water. By use of this plan, the use of the ineffective toilets has been displaced
across the city and this has really helped in saving to about 500,000 gallons of water each day. In
the addition to the replacement of the ineffective toilets, this plan conducted to over 100,000
apartment level survey on water with the aim of promoting the conservation of water. This plan
in association with the DEP worked to distribute various water saving kits some of the residents
in the city.
The third plan used by the New York City to the control the usage and conservation the
water used on a daily basis is the Residential Water Efficiency Program plan. This plan promotes
the conservation in non-residential and commercial houses by the use of optional partnerships.
This plan completed as well as launching three major water challenges in domestic houses. The
people who participated in this calculated their daily water consumption that helped them
develop a better water conservation plan (Lee et al., 2013). In addition to this, the plan also holds
some various meeting to discuss the various water conservation measures to the non-residents.
Another plan used by the New York City to the control the usage and conservation the
water used on a daily basis is the optimization of the water distribution system. The department
of Environmental Protection (DEP) has a large number of pipes that distribute water to various
consumers within the city. As water is being conveyed and transported through these
underground pipes, there is always the possibility of leakages to occur within the pipes. Due to
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the likelihood of the occurrence of these leakages, there is always the need to conduct a constant
leak detection, maintenance as well as the overall optimization of material is an important task in
the water supply management (Zecchin et al., 2007). So as to reduce the water wasted due to
these possible leakages, the DEP has some several pressure management zones for handling the
task. These pressure management help in reducing the large amounts of water gone to waste
whenever leakages occur.
The water supply shortage management is another plan that is used to in the reducing the
amount water use per day by several residents within the city. The DEP has its own ways as well
as regulations used in the management of water supply in the case of water shortage as in the
case of repairs of infrastructure. This really helps in ensuring that a lot of water is conserved that
can as well be used in future rather it going into waste.
In conclusion, it is demonstrated that domestic water use is the greatest important use of
water for a large number of people. This is shown in the various ways through which it is used
and it includes washing the dishes, doing laundry, cleaning the house and many more domestic
uses. Because water is very essential for the domestic use, there is the need to preserve it for
future use. In order to preserve this water for future uses, the New York City has implemented
various ways through which it uses to control and manage the supply of water in the city. All
these plans have brought about a successful reduction in the amount of water used per day.
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References
Gleick, P. H. (2000). A look at twenty-first century water resources development. Water
international, 25(1), 127-138.
Lee, M., Tansel, B., & Balbin, M. (2011). Influence of residential water use efficiency measures
on household water demand: A four year longitudinal study. Resources, Conservation
and Recycling, 56(1), 1-6.
Lee, M., Tansel, B., & Balbin, M. (2013). Urban sustainability incentives for residential water
conservation: Adoption of multiple high efficiency appliances. Water resources
management, 27(7), 2531-2540.
Zecchin, A. C., Maier, H. R., Simpson, A. R., Leonard, M., & Nixon, J. B. (2007). Ant colony
optimization applied to water distribution system design: Comparative study of five
algorithms. Journal of water Resources planning and Management, 133(1), 87-92.