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3 Gallons of water from brushing teeth a day? Really?

You would think Cal students are smart enough to do some basic math, but “conserve water!” posters in the bathrooms definitely do not reflect that. In solid bold and black serif, it says that we use 40 gallons of water every 10 minutes showering, and 3 gallons a day brushing our teeth. I don’t know how or where RSSP pulled that data from, but simple math and common sense says otherwise. The average shower head dispenses 2.5 gallons a minute, so 10 minutes would be 25 gallons. Although the shower heads in the dorms are arguably stronger and may dispense more water, but I’ll get to measuring that some day. Three gallons of water a day brushing teeth? That’s 1.5 gallons per brush (most people brush at least twice a day I hope?). My cup holds 500ml of water, and I use two cups worth of water per brush, plus running the faucet for about 15 seconds to wash my hands after. Totaling this up, we have about 2 liters of water, or half of a gallon. Have we been lied to? or is the RSSP simply incapable of doing simple arithmetic? We may never know. Ah, the mysteries of life.


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