Geography Investigation :D

1. Geography Investigation :D I

2. Background :3 House visited: Matthew’s house. Reason for selection: Matthew’s parents were very kind and allowed us to visit, and his house was rather big, which usually means higher bills. However, his bills were below the national average and his neighbours.

3. Start on our Water Journey: On 31st July, we went to Matthew’s house for the first time to check on his household and his water usage. Matthew’s household uses more water than the average, thus allowing the investigation to be easier due to the fact that the household might be able to see a significant decrease in water usage.

4. Process We went to Matthew’s place,on the 31st of July 2014. Our objective was to figure out what was the explicit issues that is causing the high water consumption and we have to give solutions to the issues, reducing more water used in the future.

5. July Bill: This is the water bill for July

6. Comparison for July

7. Water intensive appliances

8. Other intensive water users

9. 1st Home Visit Problems: • Family uses running hose to wash car and water plants • Family washes clothes on half load • Family uses full flush all the time after using the washroom. • All members of the family rinses teeth with running water • Family usually takes long showers up to thrice a day • Grandparents visit every other day

10. Water saving measures in place • Collect rainwater for other purposes like to flush toilets • Re-use rice/vegetable water • Try to fix leaks etc. as soon as possible as they have a free contractor a.k.a Matthew’s grandfather who used to be a self employed contractor/ worker but is now retired.

11. Suggested solutions • Recycling water used to wash clothes to wash floor of driveway, flush toilet etc. • Use a pail to wash car and water plants instead of hose • Use half flush or place stones in the top part of toilet bowl to reduce water use 4)Rinse teeth with tumbler instead of tap 5)Try to take less showers which last no more than 5 minutes

12. 2nd Home visit This time, we decided to go to Matt’s house and conduct a follow-up. Our main task was to find out if the household has heeded our advice, implement new things or just continued with their plans. Then, we will compare the bill from August with the bill of July.

13. August Bill

14. The difference in the bills There was an overall increase in water usage over the past month, despite our efforts.

15. Follow-up After realising slight increase in the water bill we asked the household why was there a slight increase instead of a decrease. When asked why was there an increase in the water bill, the family admitted that old habits do die hard and are therefore hard to break. The family thought that they were saving water as over the past month, they have been collecting rainwater to water the plants.This have thus caused the increase of the bill due to the family using more water as that month we had many visitors.

16. Conclusion Despite the fact that old habits were hard to break, the family tried other methods to conserve water but to no avail. However, the family is still willing to save water despite trying to conserve water during the follow-up.

17. Poster

18. Video and photomontage

19. References Poster creator-Piktochart Music-Brave by Sara Bareilles Images-http://luxuryactivist.com/wp-content/uploads/Water-is-the-new-luxury.jpg https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTD272utdlWHYXAoL2V_THB4kFhPkSV_8JhPIn2r-pcPPXUa_eU

20. “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.” - Mahatma Gandhi

21. THANK YOU :3