Submitted by movdqa t3_z3ohsj in newhampshire

Just looked at the water bill and it works out to 18.7 gallons (2.5 cubic feet) per person per day. I had a look at a few random websites and it seems like the average is 100 gallons per person. I had a look at the water usage amounts that they listed for tubs, showers, and toilets and it seems like they cited amounts of water for very inefficient plumbing. What's typical for NH redditors?

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Ok-Highway-3903 t1_ixmnu83 wrote

1/2 gallon. That's what I drink. I shower at the gym and shit in public bathrooms or outside.

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PiermontVillage t1_ixmref1 wrote

Large family: loads of washing per day, teens and long showers, watering lawn and garden, washing cars, leakage, etc. It adds up.

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Jeffwholives t1_ixmsthy wrote

About 35-40 gallons per person, no kids and i never use my outdoor spigots fwiw.

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akmjolnir t1_ixnaxv3 wrote

Have a well. Don't track it.

Edit: between kids and dogs and plants, it would be impossible to know.

Also, remember to check the anode in your hot water heaters/storage tanks/etc... They are cheap insurance.

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Relative_Election_81 t1_ixnhbbq wrote

I live on a boat and don't have a water maker so I'm careful to conserve water because I need to go ashore to resupply which isn't always possible depending on tide and weather conditions. That being said, between myself and two cats I typically go through about a gallon a day on days when I don't need to use any for things like cleaning or engine maintenance. That's just for drinking water and coffee, so it's fair to assume somebody in a house with readily available water would go through significantly more.

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hardsoft t1_ixnjj1w wrote

Don't know since I have a well but my kids take about half hour showers so probably an enormous amount.

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picklehaub t1_ixnly9m wrote

Have a metered softener on a well, looks like the last 6 months we average 18 gallons per person per day.

I was blown away when I first put it in, figured we were 2 or 3 hundred a day with 4 people in the house.

Low flow shower head (with the ultra low-flow restrictor pulled out) and energy star dishwasher and washing machine. Probably 8 runs of the dishwasher and 6 loads of laundry a week.

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picklehaub t1_ixobbxm wrote

4 people’s worth of breakfast, 2 kids lunchboxes plus extra pieces and usually 2 packed adult lunches plus dinner dishes during the week. I’m a little militant and won’t buy stuff that can’t go in the dishwasher. Weekends have meal prep and usually bigger meals as well.

Keeping up with thanksgiving today we are on our third load, and will probably fire off the 4th before bed. When the 20 year old dishwasher bit the dust a few years ago we were sure to get one with a third deck for little stuff. If you don’t have kids it’s hard to fathom how many things they can use in a day.

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lostinnhwoods t1_ixoknh3 wrote

Mine works out to .59 cents per person per day. Seems very efficient to me.

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Doug_Shoe t1_ixosl60 wrote

dunno. have a well. no water meter

My Mom had a pump well outside until she married my Dad and left her parents' house. They had to carry it in, so I'm thinking less water used.

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ArdernLockett t1_ixpqrzm wrote

The 100 gal/person/day is outdated or includes non-residential water usage (e.g. water used to produce the goods that you use).

With more modern fixtures and appliances, the average residential use is closer to 30-40 gal/person/day. You'd also expect less water usage during the winter where there is no water usage for residential landscaping.

Old toilets used to require 7+ gal/flush, now the standard is 6 liter/flush (1.6 gal). Washing machines are similarly more efficient. Many places still cite old water usage estimates. The US uses less water than it did in the 1970's, despite having 50% more people.

Edit: 1970's not 1907's

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Relative_Election_81 t1_ixpz67t wrote

Actually yeah, I soap up with seawater and rinse with fresh water. At the moment I'm on a river because it's sheltered, but I'm only about a mile upriver from Portsmouth harbor, so it's tidal and saltwater. "I feel like I want to watch a movie about your life" lol funny you say that, I was going to start a YouTube channel documenting my life and travels but since I got stuck up here for the winter due to my mast being damaged I haven't done so yet because I'm as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean. I can move with my backup electric motor (my gas motor was damaged at the same time as my mast) but the range is limited by my power capacity, it would really blow if I ran out of juice someplace not suitable for anchoring.

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Relative_Election_81 t1_ixpz8p9 wrote

My answer gave him a decent idea of how much water he probably drinks per day, that may not be what he was looking for exactly but it's also not completely useless. Lighten up, it's just Reddit. This is the garbage can of the internet, don't take it so seriously

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movdqa OP t1_ixqkjqw wrote

Thanks. I looked at about four sites and they generally reported 100 gpd or 300 gph. I remember when we went with Toto toilets many years ago and was struck by how little water they use compared to the originals from the 1970s.

Water scarcity is not the problem here that it is in other parts of the country but I think that it's good to conserve wherever we can.

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Dirkdiggla1 t1_ixtqb69 wrote

You're right. Both sides of my family's came here from cities and came to cities through Ellis Island but they still always had water. Southern NH though different worlds.

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Relative_Election_81 t1_ixzi02n wrote

Freedom dude. It's about the freedom. No landlords, no mortgages, and if you don't like your neighbors you can just haul up your anchor and go someplace else. When you live on a boat you have a level of independence and self-sufficiency that's almost impossible to achieve any other way. If the power grid goes down I'll be the only guy in town who will have power once the generators run out of gas, assuming the grid going down is not caused by a nuclear weapon being detonated in the atmosphere of course. That being said, my electrical system absolutely would survive an EMP caused by solar storms. I don't have to worry about unwanted people knocking at my door, solicitors aren't going to paddle out here to try and get me to join their religion or vote for their candidate. My plan was actually to avoid winter all together by heading to florida until spring then sail back North to avoid hurricane season, but my mast was damaged so that plan will have to wait until next year unfortunately, even if I were able to get my mast repaired tomorrow I missed the window for good sea conditions and my vessel is not really big enough to handle the North Atlantic in winter conditions safely, not with my level of sailing experience anyway.

TL;DR I'm basically an antisocial hermit who lives in the middle of the wilderness, but since I'm on a boat instead of in the middle of the National Forest I get all the benefits of being a hermit in the wilderness while having most of the comforts of a normal home. I won't lie though, heat is a bit of an issue.

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