cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/3972223

I come from a generally dry country and the concepts of drought & conserving the water are not new to me.

One of the things that have stunned/upset me ever since I set foot in Canada (both east & west coasts) is watching people washing their cars using a hose and tap water:

For starters, tap water is not cheap. Moreover, one definitely doesn’t need sanitised water to wash their car.

But more importantly, washing cars using a hose at home is very inefficient compared to taking it to an automatic car wash: something which is programmed to make every second of operation and every litre of water count (that’s how they make a margin after all.)

TBH I’m not sure about the real impact this has on our water reserves & if there have been any studies on similar water-inefficiencies but I have yet to watch/read/hear a advertisement, newspaper column or radio talk on this topic: these dry seasons take extra measures as, IMHO, they’re going to stay w/ us for the foreseeable future.

Am I being too sensitive about water shortage b/c of my background? What are your thoughts?

Image from Wikipedia

  • Em AdespotonEnglish
    4•1 year ago

    I’ve lived in 6 cities and two rural municipalities and never had metered water … resevoir water and well water that is relatively inexpensive. But even with that, most people’s car washing has been pretty conservative of water.

    The real issue is that the soap is just being rinsed down the storm drains into fish habitat.

    For that reason, I always take my car to a car wash where they have responsible disposal of the detergents.

    • jadero
      2•1 year ago

      TIL. The village in question is in southern Saskatchewan and I never met anyone at the water treatment conferences that was running an unmetered system. That I know of, anyway. I just thought metering was standard procedure.