All those drops
in the bucket add up
Some tips for cutting water waste
Did you know that
LEFRAK CITY COURIER | WWW.QNS.COM | DECEMBER 2017 23
the average person
without
a washing machine
at home still uses
more than 45 gallons
of water a day?
In fact that’s a conservative
estimate!
At LeFrak City,
which more than
14,000 people call
home, household water
usage totals nearly 650,000
gallons every day, adding up to nearly
24 million gallons a year.
More than a third of an average
household’s water usage comes simply
from fl ushing your toilet. Reports
show that 37% of water consumed in
a given day comes from toilets, while
24% comes from showers and baths,
22% from sinks and 17% from leaks.
With so many of us concerned
about our environment, taking a few
easy steps toward conserving water at
home will help protect our world for
years to come.
Here are some tips that you can follow
to conserve water:
• Report a leak! A leaky faucet
or toilet may not seem like a big
deal, but leaks account for an estimated
17% of household water
usage. Th at’s a lot of wasted water,
so please contact Management immediately
if you spot a leak in your
apartment.
• Shower, don’t bathe! It takes about
70 gallons of water to fi ll the standard
bathtub. Using
a standard showerhead,
a fiveminute
shower
uses just 25
gallons of
water. If you
do want to
treat yourself
to a bath,
please close
the drain before
turning on the water,
and only fi ll your
tub halfway.
• Shorten your shower! Every minute
you shorten your shower saves
up to 75 gallons of water per month.
If every LeFrak City resident were
to cut their showers by one minute
each, more than 1,000,000 gallons
of water would be conserved each
month. It makes a huge diff erence!
• Turn off the tap! Most people leave
the bathroom sink faucet running
while they wash their face, brush
their teeth or shave. Turning off
the tap, however, can save 70 gallons
of water or more per month.
One simple way to save water is to
brush your teeth while waiting for
the water to get hot, then to wash
or shave once the basin is fi lled.
• Don’t flush if you don’t have
to! Rather than throwing tissues
or other light waste in the toilet,
throw it in the trashcan.
• Get a handle on it! If your toilet
handle sticks frequently, your toilet
could be running and wasting water
long aft er you’ve fl ushed. Have
the sticks replaced or adjusted to
slow the fl ow back to normal.
• Fill the sink! If you wash your
dishes by hand, please fi ll the sink
rather than letting the faucet run.
Doing this will save between 8 and
15 gallons of water daily.
• Store your water. Keep a pitcher of
drinking water in the refrigerator
instead of turning on the tap and
letting it run until the water gets
cold.
• Reuse your water! Th ere’s no reason
to pour unused clean water
down the drain. Use it instead to
clean your home or water a houseplant.
Around the grounds
» You can also help LeFrak City
conserve water by keeping a
careful eye out for waste around
the grounds.
» If you believe a washing machine
is inefficient, or if you think
it is leaking, please inform
Management right away.
» When lawns are being watered
during the summer, make a
mental note of the time of day
you see the sprinklers on. Lawns
are best watered while the sun
is down to reduce evaporation.
Report to Management any
instance in which you see the
sprinklers running during the
middle of the day.
» Also let Management know if you
see someone using water to clean
walkways instead of sweeping
them, or if you spot broken
sprinklers or leaky or broken
pipes.
Where it goes: Average household water usage
Toilets Showers Sinks Leaks
and baths
37 % 24 % 22 % 17 %