How many times do you touch the tap in a day?
Gardening Australia host Costa Georgiadis is challenging Aussies to become more mindful of their water usage by not using your taps for 12 hours.
"The idea isn't to point the bone at people, it's about working out how on auto-pilot we are so we can become more water conscious," Costa told The Senior.
The gardener took part in Water Night on October 22, where, from the hours of 5pm - 5am, people pledged not to touch their taps and instead used water from one bucket filled up previously.
"It's not about making people uncomfortable," he said, explaining people could still use separate water bottles for drinking and can still flush the toilet.
Water is one of our most precious resources, but many of us are oblivious to how much we actually use compared to how much we have.
"Of all the water on the planet, only 3.5 per cent is actually drinkable and usable. Our use of water is increasing, and our population in increasing, but our usable water supply isn't."
So how much water are we using around the home?
"Every few seconds a tap is on, that's one litre of water down the drain," Costa said.
Flushing the toilet uses 4.5 litres, brushing your teeth uses 7.5 litres, while a full-load of a dishwasher uses 20 litres. A 10 minute shower uses 90 litres.
And if you're putting off fixing that dripping tap, it's worth knowing that it wastes 12,000 litres of water per year while a leaking toilet wastes 96,000 litres per year.
Costa said there are plenty of tried and true methods for saving water, including using greywater, reducing shower time, using a trigger hose in the garden, not rinsing plates before going in the dishwasher, turning off the tap while brushing your teeth and even turning off the tap while using soap in the shower.
"Simple ways to save water in the garden is to use mulch so the sun doesn't evaporate the water out of the soil and to improve organic composition throughout the soil using compost," he said.
"Compost is like a sponge beneath the mulch that will keep the water so you use less."
To find out more about Water Night visit https://waternight.com.au/
