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Guam - As the summer months are fast approaching this is the time of the year when residents need to be more conscientious about their water consumption.


GWA spokesperson Heidi Ballendorf said, "We want people to conserve their water usage we have lots of fact on our website and you could even go on the Internet and type in water conservation and get tons of great information. I am happy to say that I think the message of saving water is getting out in Guam here at Guam Waterworks we are not selling as much water as we use to in the past so that's a good thing we want people to use less water in the end."


Worldwide communities are faced with water shortages for a variety of reasons including diminishing new water supplies for development, and climate change causing drought or flood-related emergencies from a lack of portable water supply.


Ballendorf explained, saying, "If you watch the news in the States there's lots of issues with drought especially in California. We are very fortunate here we have an abundant lovely overflowing aquifer our aquifer yield which is to say that the production of the aquifer is as much as 80 million gallons everyday that we could take from the aquifer we take less than half of that and that feeds about 90 percent of Guam."


Ballendorf says that less than half of that is utilized by 90 percent of the island with only two villages receiving their water from Fena Lake. In the past water conservation was perceived to be applicable only during a drought as a way to ration customers when supplies were severely limited. Today it has progressed to business as usual. But if water is abundant then why conserve?


"We are very fortunate that no we don't have water shortage we don't have a lot of issues that they do have in the states but we don't want to get to that point and that's why water conservation is really important because we want to have lots of reserve in our aquifer," she said.


So what can we do as a community to help conserve this precious resource? "Well one of the things especially during the month of May, May is a hotter month and it doesn't rain as much and that's what makes may such a hot dry month and why we do promote water conservation month you don't want to water your plants your grass in the heat of the day so try to wake up early the sun gets up really early these days so get up and water your plants early in the morning or when the sun goes down," she said.


Residents can also use rain water catchment systems to water plants. Another key tip is reducing the amount of wasted water.


This is as simple as turning off the water while brushing your teeth or while soaping dirty dishes, only turning it on when you are ready to rinse. Residents can also help conserve water by ensuring that there are no leaks or breaks in water lines and plumbing in their homes and reporting those leaks in a timely manner to GWA. We can all do our part by thinking green and joining to conserve water.