Urban Sewage

Question 1

Water Conservation

Answer 1

Not just saving water, but also saving energy, and water treatment costs

Tools and initiatives (brown lawns to water metering, low flow technology

Question 2

Half Flush

Answer 2

3 litres x 6 per day = 18 litres x 365 days = 6570 litres

Question 3

Full Flush

Answer 3

6 litres x 1 per day = 6 litres x 365 days = 2190 litres

Question 4

Going beyond water conservation…

Answer 4

Matching water quality with end use (grey water for irrigation)

Decentralized water service and delivery

Looking for the service we are after, without need for water

Compost toilets, solar aquatics, not sewage

Xeriscape, not mono-culture lawns

Question 5

What is a watershed

Answer 5

“All the land area that drains into a stream system is called a watershed” (Natural Resources Canada 2008)
or
“The upslope area draining into a given on a river” (Holden 2014)
or
“The geographical area that drains into a river or a reservoir” (Hendriks 2010)

Question 6

Watersheds as policy-sheds, problem-sheds

Answer 6

Sometimes watersheds are called basins, drainage basins, catchments, or river basins. They all have the same meaning.

Question 7

Scale Matters

Answer 7

Watersheds can be very small (hilltop draining 10s of square meters)

Watersheds can be very large (Amazon River watershed draining over 6 million square kilometers! That’s one-fifth of the world’s annual river discharge)

Question 8

Politics and Watershed

Answer 8

The Amazon watershed includes 6 countries (Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Columbia, and Brazil)

Watershed boundaries follow height of land, or topographical, features

Political boundaries are more arbitrary and do not necessarily follow watershed boundaries