Water withdrawals for public use can be applied to street cleaning, fire fighting, municipal parks, public swimming pools, and other domestic/commercial, agricultural, thermoelectric power purposes. Per capita (per person) use of public water supplies in the United States (1990) averaged 183 gallons per day (gal/d). The average per capita use can vary greatly between communities for any number of reasons, including, but not limited to:
Climate differences
The land use mix
Household sizes
Lot sizes
Public uses
Income brackets
Age and condition of distribution
system
For instance, per capita use of public water is about 50 percent higher in the West than the East mostly due to the amount of landscape irrigation in the West. Rural areas typically consume less water for domestic purposes than larger towns.
In Michigan, municipal water supply systems provide most of the public drinking water. Municipalities withdrew an estimated 1.2 bgd of water from the Great Lakes, groundwater, or in a few instances inland lakes and rivers. In 1980, 34 bgd of water was withdrawn for municipal use nationwide. Other domestic and public uses accounted for 22 bgd, while industrial and commercial use amounted to 12 bgd. Groundwater sources supplied approximately 35% of the total.
In 1990, water withdrawn nationwide for public supplies totaled 38,530 million gallons per day (Mgal/d). Of the total water withdrawn, 72 percent went to domestic and commercial uses, 13 percent to industrial uses, and 0.2 percent to thermoelectric power. The remaining 14 percent went to public uses such as fire protection or was lost during distribution (usually due to leaks).
Demand projections for municipal water use have been relatively consistent with population projections, with municipal withdrawal expected to increase by 32% by the year 2000. Such an increase will require municipal water conservation to be a major factor in municipal water supplies. Conservation of these supplies can be accomplished through maintenance and repair of existing facilities, residential conservation methods such as water pricing policies to reduce demand, metering water use, and water use restrictions. ’ (Dzurik 1990)
