The Ice Bucket Challenge is so last week.
We’ve moved on.
This week it’s the “Dirty Car Pledge,” a water-saving campaign hatched by a Los Angeles-area conservation group aimed at breaking old habits and saving millions of gallons of H20 in the process.
As California’s drought lingers with no relief in sight, Santa Monica-based Los Angeles Waterkeeper is encouraging motorists to take a “Dirty Car Pledge” and refrain from washing their vehicles for 60 days.
Call it the new Ice Bucket Challenge, except that no ice — or water — is involved. And it’s not for charity.
But there are stickers.
Sure, after 60 water-free days, your car will be encrusted with dirt, grease, bird poop, squashed bugs and other unmentionables.
But you’ll be saving water. Big time.
And if you take the pledge at http://lawaterkeeper.org/DirtyForTheDrought, Los Angeles Waterkeeper will mail you a free “Dirty Car Pledge” sticker to let everyone know there’s a reason you’ve renounced the hose and bucket.
And it’s not because you don’t care about society’s conventions. No, you’re doing your part to save water, mankind and the planet.
Don’t worry — that free “Go Dirty for the Drought” sticker won’t gum up your paint job either. The sticky-stuff-free #DirtyCarPledge decal uses “static cling” to hold on to your car and won’t ruin the finish, says Los Angeles Waterkeeper.
The advocacy group reminds us that even though Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency over the drought nearly nine months ago, we’re still using the wet stuff like it’ll never stop pouring out of the tap.
The group says L.A. residents each use an average of 122 to 129 gallons of water a day. That’s way more than in drought-challenged nations such Australia and Israel, where per-capita water use is a paltry 40 to 60 gallons a day.
So we’ve got a long way to go. And a couple months of driving a dirty car can’t hurt, right?
It all begs the question: How much water can you save by not washing your car?
Washing a car at home uses about 85 gallons of water, says Los Angeles Waterkeeper. And the runoff from bathing your alloy-rimmed beauty goes right into the sewer system, then to the ocean.
Not ideal.
Even at a commercial car wash, putting your vehicle through the soap-soaked brushes, water-shooting spritzers and big rotating furry thingamabobs uses an average of 56 gallons of water, says L.A. Waterkeeper. And that “average” includes car wash facilities that recycle their water, so you can’t pull that card.
What if the campaign takes off, Ice-Bucket style? If 10,000 Southern Californians who normally wash their cars every two weeks took the two-month #DirtyCarPledge, we would save about 3 million gallons of the wet stuff, says L.A. Waterkeeper.
“Over 2,000 people have already taken the Dirty Car Pledge, and we just launched the campaign a week ago,” said Los Angeles Waterkeeper spokeswoman Rachel Stich. “And while saving a few million gallons of water is no small feat, the bigger impact is getting people to think about the drought and do their part to conserve water in their daily lives.”
Los Angeles Waterkeeper is up to more than getting you to drop the bucket and step away from the spigot. The group has an overall conservation message and is urging state and local agencies to capture and reuse more storm water (like it’s ever going to rain again), recycle more water and generally educate residents about their responsibilities during the drought.
“The City of Los Angeles should be at the forefront of making more water-conscious decisions,” said Liz Crosson, Los Angeles Waterkeeper executive director. “Over 80 percent of the city’s water is imported from faraway ecosystems like the Bay-Delta and the endangered Colorado River. We can no longer rely on our past efforts, and each of us needs to take individual actions like replacing lawns with drought-tolerant plants, using water-efficient appliances, installing grey water systems and not wasting water in your daily activities.”
Are you fired up? Or do you just hate washing your car? Either way, you can take the Dirty Car Pledge today at http://www.LAWaterkeeper.org/DirtyForTheDrought.
