Our two filter plants together can produce 225 million gallons of drinking water a day for our 860,000 residents. And we are now recycling about 9.6 billion gallons of that water every year by returning cleaned, highly treated wastewater to Lake Lanier.
In Gwinnett County, we are serious about water and water conservation. We are continuing to upgrade the capacity of our water and wastewater facilities to meet our community’s needs for the foreseeable future. It’s a prudent investment.
Our Water Resources department is proactively saving water with an aggressive leak-detection program and a pricing structure that encourages water conservation. All County departments have taken positive steps to conserve water, such as discontinuing irrigation and vehicle washing and installing water-efficient fixtures.
You can help the effort by finding ways to conserve water in your daily life. Fix that dripping faucet. Install low-flow faucets and showerheads. And don’t water your lawn in the heat of the day—or when it’s raining. Remember, saving water can save money, too!
Since 2008, a rebate program has helped owners of older homes and apartments replace about 18,000 inefficient toilets with new WaterSense®-certified models that use 1.28 gallons per flush or less. We’re even recycling the old toilets by crushing them for use under road beds and keeping 290 tons of waste out of Gwinnett County landfills.
Gwinnett County has given more than $1.5 million in toilet rebates, and we’re now saving nearly 300,000 gallons of water every day. Rebates are still available. You can find details by visiting www.northgeorgiawater.org or calling 404.463.8645.
We have a how-to brochure on do-it-yourself home water audits along with low-flow home retrofit kits. They’re available free at the Water Resources billing counter at 684 Winder Highway in Lawrenceville. The kit includes a low-flow showerhead, two one-gallon-per-minute bathroom faucet aerators, a 1.5-gallon-per-minute kitchen faucet aerator, and dye tablets to help find toilet leaks.
Water Resources also presents Homeowner H2O workshops to help residents learn about water conservation. Several hundred residents attended one last year. We also have a school outreach program called Water on Wheels that travels to primary schools, scout groups, summer camps, libraries, and recreation centers. It reached more than 5,000 students last year.
To schedule an educational program for your group, contact Heather Moody at dwrconserve@gwinnettcounty.com or 678.376.6722. All these public outreach programs are free to Gwinnett County residents, schools, and businesses.
You can learn more about water conservation in Gwinnett County, by going online to http://www.DWRconserve.com
