May Riot for Austerity Numbers

I have taken the Average Annual American Household (AAAH) figures (when those were the figures given) and divided by 12 for the numbers to beat. I count the numbers during the month I receive them. Below are those received in the month of May.

ELECTRIC
The AAAH uses 917 units per month for electricity.

May: My May reading of 179 kwh was…
…down 80.48% (738 kwh) from the national average.
…down 101.68% (182 kwh) from my own usage 12 months ago.
…my lowest electrical usage month since I began R4A.

My eleven-month electrical usage (for July-May) was 3,649 kwh. This is…
…down 63.83%, or 6,438 kwh from the national average
…down 45.41%, or 1,475 kwh from my own usage during the same months 12 months prior.

HOUSEHOLD GAS
The AAAH uses 83.33 per month for household gas.

May: 7.1 therms. This is down 91.48% from the national average, and down 10.3 therms from the previous month.

Eleven-Month Usage: My usage for July-May was 411.10 therms. This is down 505.57 therms, or 55.15% from the national average. This puts me at an average monthly therm usage of 37.37

WATER

The Average American uses 100 gallons of water per day. A 90% reduction would be 10 gallons of water usage per day. I get my water bill every quarter.

May: This bill was for 88 days, and listed my usage for the period as 3,000 gallons. This is 5,800 gallons or 65.91% less than the average individual. Finally my reduction efforts are starting to show!

Four Quarterly Bills: My usage for the last four quarterly bills was 21,750 gallons. The “Average American” would have used 38,600 gallons, so my usage was 16,850 gallons less than the Average. This is a decrease of 43.65%.

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Water Reduction

Since I started the Riot for Austerity in July of last year, I have done almost everything to reduce my water usage. I now shower every third day instead of every day. I skip a flush (or two). My dishwasher now only runs about once a week (I have been reusing not so dirty plates and bowls) and I have my laundry down to roughly one load per week.

In the past I have been frustrated when the water bill arrived, since I didn’t think it adequately represented my use – in fact I was almost sure they were just guessing… no meter reading… just making up a number. After all, how many people actually scan their utility bills like all of us seem to do these days? A handful, maybe?

However, I received the most recent bill from the water company a few days ago, and am happy to report that my reduction efforts are finally showing up as a reduction on their love notice. This bill was for 88 days, and listed my usage for the period as 3,000 gallons, or 34.09 gallons per day. This is 5,800 gallons or 65.91% less than the average individual uses at 90 gallons per day. Finally my reduction efforts are starting to show!

I’m a far cry from the 90% reduction that was the goal, but I have reduced my usage from approximately 74 gallons per day (from the beginning of this challenge) to approximately 34 gallons per day.

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