Water is a precious commodity but we don’t always treat it that way. We are so used to turning on our water taps and seeing water flowing freely. Most of us pay our bills to Affinty Water and the Environment Agency are responsible for managing water resources.

We might think that we don’t have to worry too much. We have plenty of rain, so some water is bound to end up where it ought to. We might be more wrong about this than we think. Even in normal times in southern and eastern England there’s less water available per person than in many Mediterranean countries, because of relatively low rainfall and the density of population.  We now use 50% more water than we did 25 years ago, partly because of power showers and household appliances.

Using water in our homes contributes around 35 million tonnes of greenhouse gases a year, that's 1.5 tonnes per year per family using 500 litres a day.

We all need to make changes become better at saving as much water as we can. The Environment Agency gives advice on how to save water and Affinty Water have a diagram of a water efficient house which you can explore to find out ways to generally improve your water efficiency in your home. The Building Futures guide gives advice on integrating waste conservation into developments to enable improved water conservation.

A report by the Energy Savings Trust  on water use in the home also links water and energy use. It shows that showers are the biggest water consumers using a quarter of the water. It also shows that over three-quarters of people overfill the kettle.  Both of these actions cost Britains millions of pounds worth of energy every year as well as water.

Businesses can get water efficiency advice from Rippleeffect run by WRAP.

Free Water Saving Devices for the home are available from Affinity Water. 

'Get Composting' sell waterbutts as well as subsidised price composters for Herts residents