What is Your Water Plan? Quantity, Storage

I live in Colorado so one of my worries is water. Are there any rules of thumb for water per person? I looked up some stuff but it is way out of line, multiple showers per day, yadda yadda yadda. So how much should a guy have in storage for long term situation? What kind of tank or storage method are you using? How do you keep it fresh?

In the new dutch compain to educate people about prepardness, they recommend 4 liters. Which interestingly generated complains from a watercompany, because apparently there is a law that says you should have 3 liters...

But in reality, the amount per day depends on your needs:
2-3 liters (more in hot conditions) for comsuption.
0.5 liter to brush your teeth.
2-3 liters for cooking and washing food.

This means no shower, no washing hands, no water to clean anything, nothing to flush your toilet, etc, etc. A shower takes about 43.7 liters and flushing toilets for one person a day 35.8 liters (dutch average). This does not include washing hands, washing clothing, etc. So how much luxeury do you want when something is going badly? Answer is up to you.

New Dutch campaign?? Haven't heared of it.

One alternative to a flush toilet is a composting toilet. The cheap-but-sanitary way to handle this in an enclosed space is 2 5-gal buckets, one with a toilet seat mounted on it and the other filled with something naturally absorbant/drying (sawdust, sand, fine shredded leaf litter, even kitty litter if thats all you have on hand (not sure how compostable that is though) or a combination). Each time you use it, just cover with a healthy scoop from the other bucket. Dump the bucket when full. If you're in a long-term situation you may want to check out the book 'Humanure' and see how you can use the waste as fertilizer or at least how to keep the dump site from attracting attention/smelling.

it started 2 weeks ago, the checklist with the recommended kit is really short and basic. But it's a start and making them longer and more complicated might turn off dutch people that aren't used to the prepardness thing. The compagin is called "denk vooruit": http://denkvooruit.crisis.nl/

Thanks for the info. I wouldn't be surprised if this was one of your projects, PC2K. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

I know we all bash FEMA quite a bit, but here's a link to their suggestions:
http://www.fema.gov/plan/prepare/water.shtm

Doug's got great information here on ETS:
http://www.equipped.org/72hourkit.htm

Both recommend a gallon per person, per day. FEMA goes on to mention that a normally active person needs at least a 1/2 gallon per day just for drinking.

I toyed with keeping water in a large Reliance water jug and rotating it every month. That became a real pain in the you-know-what. Then I tried the Nalgene bottles and Platypus water bladder route. Finally I came to realize simplicity is great.

I went with mostly 0.5L bottled water. Sure, it can get somewhat expensive. But I try to buy in bulk from Costco, Wal-Mart (ugh), or on sale at the grocery store. I've found that not only is it easier to rotate, I also drink more water day to day, which is a good thing. Especially in the hot summer. Plus, with the half-liter bottles you can easily hand them out, throw them in the cooler while camping, put in your backpack for a quick hike (yeah, I know, not really leak-resistant. Nalgene's rock!), or whatever else. They also keep nice and cold in the fridge.

Also, I've picked up a few of the 1 gallon Arrowhead jugs at Wal-Mart that are all of $1 each. They make a good augmentation. For $3 you can have enough water for 72 hours for 1 person. Not bad at all.

one idea for storing water and keeping it fresh is to invest in an inline 100-300 gallon water tank. You plumb it into your water system in the house between the water main and the rest of the house so water circulates through the tank. If water stops flowing you still have a decent supply of water and it is rotated automatically for you. Around here at least if you watch the paper you'll occasionally see water tanks for sale or for free.

I actually have around 20 cases of the 1 liter bottles for emergency drinking that I rotate at home from Costco.. I also have a few .5 liter cases to fill the cars with when we go out.

Then I have 7 gallon containers (10 of them) with the idea they would be used for non-drinking use.

I thought "humanure" wasn't the best fertilizer? Isn't it more toxic then cow manure?

20 gallons a day per person, all purposes
7 gallons a day per horse, drinking
5-6 gallons a day per cow, drinking

Reccomendation is a 3-4 day supply

(This is from _Farm Machinery_ "Practical Hints for Handy-Men", ISBN 1-55821-951-x)

Of course, this assumes normal day to day operation--in survival mode, drinking water/sponge bath only, a person in a hot climate can (and has!) consumed as much as twelve liters a day. Of course, at the time, I was not acclimated to the heat/humidity of the region....

One gallon(4liters) per person per day is a minimum. I started small by washng out 2 L pop bottles and filling and adding 4 drops of bleach per liter. I refill every six months. At first I did this June 1 and Dec1 but as the amout I had stored went up I've started doing some every month to make it easier. I now use container up to and including the Reliance7 gallon containers. I've have decided for me the Reliance 2.5 gal containers are the way to go. They are easy to move and fill. While the 7 gal are nice having recently had a heart attack lifting 60 lbs isn't my idea of fun. I consider 1 2.5 gal containers to be a one day supply. If you can afford them the military water cans from Brigadequartermaster are the best going.

Bob

I am lucky, were I live I have a very high water table and a well that even in the driest summers has never gone dry.
One summer we pumped out over 100 gal and the next day it was back to were it was before we pumped it.

> 2-3 liters (more in hot conditions) for comsuption.
> 0.5 liter to brush your teeth.
> 2-3 liters for cooking and washing food.

I have measured my consumption at about 1l per day. I reckon 2l would include cooking. (For example, a portion of rice takes me 300ml.) Brushing my teeth can be done in 100ml each time.

recommended waterconsumption is 2 liters per day for a healthy adult. Being in a situation without water, usually also means a problem with other infrastructure. Like electricity, this mean more fysical work, which require additional water consumption.

I personally plan with a wide margen, it's beter to have too much, than too little.

A lot of that depends on what you're eating, where you're sourcing your food and how healthy you are (actually all that pertains to any kind of biological 'waste', cow or otherwise). In that kind of situation though, it's more about making a positive use out of your waste than the quality of the fertilizer, especially if services like sewer and waste disposal are not available. All the better since you don't need to foul gallons of water if you handle your personal waste via compost. And that's also why I recommended ppl find that book, because it addresses some of the short-comings of human waste as fertilizer.

I store water in 2 30gal. plastic drums in the cellar (2 people). BTW, Arizona Iced Tea jugs are very sturdy. I use them for water in the car & truck.

I start with 1 gallon per person per day, but store roughly twice what I expect to need. My stockpile now is almost all cases holding 3 one gallon bottles from WalMart. The bottles are those HDPE "milk jug" material which is fairly fragile, but the bottles just sit on a shelf, inside the cardboard boxes, so they're pretty protected. I don't rotate that water at all and some of it is approaching 2 years old now. I'll probably rotate it at the 3 or 4 year mark more because I'm worried about the plastic bottles holding up. I think a 3 gallon case is about $1.80 right now, so it's hard to beat the price. I used to store water in rinsed out 2 liter soda bottles and would consider it again just because of how much sturdier they are. They're just hard to stack and move unless you borrow some supermarket bottle trays.

I have 18 boxes or 54 gallons for my family of four. I also typically fill up some 7 and 5 gallon containers (and the bathtubs) when a hurricane approaches. Even in the worst likely case, that gives me enough for my family with plenty left for another family for a week.

I keep the minimum for drinking water: 1 gallon per person per day, and 1/2 gallon per pet per day. From March to November I also keep 40 gallons in the water tank of the RV. This gives me about 2 weeks worth. Not enough I know but it's a start. I'll get a few more Aquatainers in the near future.

AZ ioced tea jugs are great water jugs!

I have several systems: three kinds of water filters on hand, a case of .5 literbottles and am going to add 10+ 2 L soda bottles as back-up.

TRO

If you have any dollar stores near you, keep an eye out for their bottled water. They have 1 gallon clear PETE bottles that are tallish (5.5x5.5" x 12"tall) and without a built-in handle like the milk jugs.

Their 'handle' is a sturdy plastic ring attached to the collar around the neck. Compact, easy to store.

Lily, that Humanure Handbook is GREAT!

Sue

My local supermarket has bottled water in 2.5 gallon rectangular ptfe containers with a spigot on the bottom, normally about $3 each but occasionally on sale for $1 each, so I have a few of those. I also used to drink bottled water (1 gallon crystal geyser) but have since decided it's a scam. Anyway those 1 gallon bottles are reasonably durable and refillable (pretty sturdy screw top). So I'd drink the bottled water, then refill the empty bottles with tap water and stash them away. I have about 6-8 of those. Plus I usually pick up a 24-bottle case of 0.5l bottles when they go on sale ($3.99 fairly regularly). I keep a case of or so of those in the car and drink them when I get thirsty on the road, and add more when supply gets low. That takes care of rotation all by itself.

An item I rarely see discussed here is marine desalinators. I keep thinking I'd buy one if I hit the lottery. For $2000 or so on ebay you can get a unit that turns 20+ gallons/hour of sea water into fresh water using 12 volt power. Since I live near the ocean that would provide basically unlimited drinking/washing water for a few people as long as there was some fuel available to run a 12 volt generator (e.g. automobile) with.

I'm in an apartment so having a water tank is impractical but if I were in an owned-house-with-yard type of environment, I'd think of installing a 500+ gallon underground cistern. There's a place on ebay that sells those prefabbed (plastic) for a few hundred bucks. It seems very practical, out of sight, fill via garden hose and rotate by pumping some out to water the lawn with a few times a year.

I have a "multi-prong" water plan. Every 6 months, all stored water is dumped and the containers refilled. Potable water consists of a 55 gal drum and 2 liter soda bottles that have been cleaned & refilled as they were emptied of soda. After Dec 1st, each year, I dump the "extra" 2 liter bottles (keeping a certain number always) and recycle the jugs. Starting May 1st of each year, I again start saving empty soda jugs and fill them with water. IRT non-potable water, I have quite a few 5 gal jugs that hold this water & I refresh them every 6 months when I change out the potable water. IRT sewage, I have a porta-potty that is filled from the non-potable water jugs and I will dump the filled porta-potty reservoir down the toilet, as long as the sewage lines continue to flow. When the sewage lines stop flowing, I'll have to resort to the storm drain in the front of my home for my dumping ground. This is not the best of plans but it is the most realistic plan available.

The best luck is what you make yourself!