Water Usage Statistics

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Our goal with water usage was to use water at a fraction of a level of a traditional commercial office building. We did this in a variety of ways, from selection of efficient plumbing fixtures to reduction of use of city water through the use of cisterns. Our data is below.

Our 2 cisterns, prior to placement. The larger cistern, 1,400 gallons, is under our parking lot, and the smaller, 500 gallons, is on top of our 3-season room. Both are fed with water coming from our roof.

Measurement Decisions

  • The statistics come from our monthly City of Detroit water bills.
  • Unit of measure = gallons (water dept measures in cu, where 1cu = 100 cubic feet = 728 gallons)
  • 'Usage Per Person' is calculated based on the number of people that are in Businesses-in-Residence at the beginning of each month, plus the number of volunteers and paid contractors that work more than 2 days a week.

Sources of Water

  • Our water comes from the City of Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, which gets its water from the Detroit River and Lake Huron.
  • Water for outside use comes from 2 cisterns, one on top of our roof, and one under our parking lot. Together, they collect about 2,000 gallons of water.

Uses of Water

  • 4 Toilets (@ 1.28 gal/flush)
  • 5 Sinks
    • 3 Bathroom (0.5 gal/min + automated)
    • 1 Kitchen
    • 1 Mop-basin
  • 2 Dishwasher (4 gal / load)
  • 1 Shower (2.5 gal/min shower head)
  • Coffee / Drinking
  • Outdoor watering. We harvest the water that we use for outdoor watering in 2 cisterns (1,700 gallons total) and only use city water when the other water is exhausted. Our goal is to use no city water for outdoor use.

Water Usage Charts

There were 93 people in the building in March 2020

Green Garage Monthly Water Usage - Mar 2019- Mar 2020




Monthly Water Usage per Person Comparison - Mar 2019 - Mar 2020



Monthly Water Use Comparison - Mar 2019 - Mar 2020




Monthly Water Costs - Mar 2019 - Mar 2020




Monthly Water Costs per Person - Mar 2019 - Mar 2020



2019 Water Usage Charts

Monthly Water Usage

Per Person Water Use Compared to Industry Standard

Total Monthly Water Use Compared to Industry Standard

Monthly Water Costs

Water Costs per Person

See Also