Water Usage.... CHIME IN!!!!!!!

[mom'sfolly]

My lot is less than a 1/4 acre, and in the summer in Texas we use about 24000 gallons. 60,000 gallons for a well watered 1/2 acre in desert doesn't seem that outrageous to me...high but not completely unreasonable.

 

[Carols Clucks]

I think you will find water rates vary a lot depending on availability and source.

My moms neighbor on a lot half her size says if your bill is under $100 you are not watering your garden enough.

We watch every drop, have a very nice deep green lawn....slightly larger than a postage stamp and no washing machine or dishwasher and usually stay under $100 a month

 

[RaZ]

Quote:
My water table is about 35 - 50 feet down. However, it is "illegal" to have a well where I live so I am forced to buy water from the city of Detroit. It runs about 11 cents per gallon.

So I installed 12 55 gallon rain barrels. Guesss what? They are illegal too.

Gotta love ordinances...

 

[baltimoreharps]

Feeling the pain here...really. We're in a very unique situation here on our farm. The city line runs through our pasture and so we have city water for the house and for at least one outside line. We also have two wells on the property, one electric and one that is from the original well and is hand cranked.
My city water is going through the roof. I have a bill of 115 for the last month. That's just with the basics, we have 5 people here, showers go about every other day for the family members, plus about 3 laundry loads a weeks, daily dishes with an energy effiecent dishwasher and don't get me started about the city scale of usage. We pay 8 cents per thousand gallons used and it adds up really fast.
I'm doing everything I know to do to save water and even with that, my bill goes higher each month. Can't win for losing.

I'm getting neurotic about water usage lately because there is nothing I can do other than to pay and just smile and grit my teeth the entire time.

 

[debilorrah]

I couldn't figure out my bill to tell ya all about gallons, we are billed in units. And my last bill for two months was $197. And that is because I left the hose on in the pond for two days without realizing it.

 

[scooby]

mom'sfolly :

My lot is less than a 1/4 acre, and in the summer in Texas we use about 24000 gallons. 60,000 gallons for a well watered 1/2 acre in desert doesn't seem that outrageous to me...high but not completely unreasonable.

we don't live in the dessert we are at about 6500 ft. surrounded by mountains and this year we had so much snow and rain we flooded from the melt and then all summer we have had storm after storm......thats another reason the bills are ludicrous cause we haven't had to water that much cause we've gotten some type of rain almost every week or 2. I can believe that much water in texas this year with the drought, my family lives at buchannan lake and cherokee. in fact there wells are pretty much dry.

At the last town meeting they told us that we are not allowed to remove our new meter lids because they are expensive and have to be sealed properly so that they dont freeze. so now we have to contact someone from the town council to come and remove the lids and seal them. we have not checked the new meter for movement yet cause we've only had it about a month and a half but we checked the old one and it did not move.
Also when reading a meter do you have to multiply the number by 5's or 10's , this is what they are telling us that they have to do so my meter will read a difference of 2000 but i'll get a bill for 20,000 gallons.​

 

[KenK]

I test water billing systems at several towns and counties. 15,000-30,000 gallons of month is in no way "normal" usage for a family. Without outside watering or leaks the average is something like 4,000-5,000 gallons.

15,000 gallons a month is about 500 gallons a day. Picture ten, 50 gallon drums lined up. Do you think you are using that much water?

I think your town council maybe confused on the "multiplying".

 

[CowgirlJules]

scooby, it depends on the meter. All of the ones I'm in charge of are direct read. Can't imagine multiplying anything, except to get from cubic feet to gallons. The bills are in gallons, so on the few cf meters I have, I do a conversion in a spreadsheet, 7.48 gallons per cubic foot. I've never seen any that only read a tenth of the actual use, bu they may exist.

 

[mom'sfolly]

I looked up annual rainfall in Sevier UT, and the websites I saw said less than 10 inches a year. Given the average rainfall, altitude and general location, my guess is that the area would be considered high mountain desert. This is climate generally means low humidity, poor soil moisture retention and low average rainfall. I know that the last couple of winters in Utah have had some unusual snowfall amounts, and snow pack well into the spring, but that doesn't mean that the average precipitation is up more than a few inches.

Until a pump broke recently, my water district allowed lawn watering twice a week. We only water every five days, so actually have lower usage than some of our neighbors. Texas has water problems and will continue to do so. I've been slowly changing my lawn into well-mulched xeric beds, and hardscaping. I think that in the American West water shortages will become an issue for social unrest, political turmoil, and a cause for migration before oil shortages cause problems. Already states like Texas, Arizona and California are looking at who gets water, what the priorities are, whether municipalities get more water than farmers, whether watering restrictions are passed on homeowners or farmers first, etc. We have unsustainable growth, with little restrictions on how water is used. Unfortunately, it is a finite resource that is absolutely essential.

 

[scooby]

Quote:
my friend owns a water tank tuck and pumps for the oil rigs, his tanks are 5,000 gallons.... i told my friend they need to drive his truck over to town hall and park it in front for town meeting, and give the council a visual...... they are saying we are using 4 times the amount of one tank and for some familys like my neighbor 8 times that amount.