Gestão do uso da água: análise dos benefícios ambientais e financeiros da utilizaçao de aparelhos hídrico-sanitários mais eficientes.

Abstract

Freshwater is an indispensable natural resource for life; therefore, adopting protectionist and conservationist measures is of paramount importance. However, demand for freshwater use has increased significantly as a result of increased industrial production, agricultural activity and population growth, requiring the adoption of conservation and preservation measures to avoid a future collapse by indiscriminate use. Therefore, it is believed that protective and sustainable strategies can contribute to the potential of water resources on the planet. Among these strategies can be mentioned the rational use of water, avoiding waste, pollution of water sources, increasing the power of abstraction and reservoirs and minimizing domestic, agricultural and industrial consumption. In this study, the emphasis is on hydrosanitary consumption in a university, using hydro efficient equipment as a protective and sustainable measure. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the environmental and financial benefits of using efficient hydrosanitary equipments. To obtain the proposed objectives, initially, the hydrosanitary devices installed were identified, evaluating if they could be replaced by some saving and/or regulating model; then the consumption of the current appliances and saving and/or regulators models was estimated, calculating the water savings obtained with the use of the most efficient. After conducting a market research in the city of Sousa, it was determined that the time of return on investment of the adoption efficient apparatus. According to the results, it can be verified that the replacement of the existing hydrosanitary equipments by saving and/or regulating models presented a considerable reduction in the consumption of water (estimated 80,000 liters per month) with a time of return on investment in 14 months, approximately; however, for some equipment the return on investment may exceed 2 years.