As we all know, water and energy are our way of life. From your body, to your hygiene and even to electricity, the human kind is always in desperate need of water. Here in Canada, especially in Mississauga, we are fortunate enough to have a sufficient amount of clean water. Although, keep reading to find out issues that we are encountering as a nation.

Next up is energy. Similar to water, we use different types of energy in our daily lives, especially electricity. From waking up in the morning, cooking your breakfast, driving your car to work/school, heating/cooling your house, turning on the lights and the list could continue for eternity! But the point is, in our modern day life, we are completely dependent on electricity.

IMPORTANCE OF SUSTAINABILITY

So from reading a brief explanation about the ways we utilize water and electricity, we should realize how important it is to sustain these two things. Sustainability means to be able to keep a resource usable for generations to come. And at this rate, we are failing. If we cannot sustain water and energy, the years ahead of us will be doomed. There will be massive changes in the ways we do our everyday tasks, and it will be extremely difficult for anyone to adapt to. Therefore, we need to make changes as of this moment to prevent issues from occurring in the future.

ISSUES

Anywhere in the world, the different needs of water change and develop as years go by, differing from country to country. Here in Canada, a fully developed country, most of us citizens take water for granted. There are a few areas in Canada where water is not the most abundant resources such as First Nations Reserves, although Mississauga is rich with usable water. Due to this, we tend to take it for granted, we overuse water, therefore our consumption rate is huge! Have you ever caught yourself leaving the tap on while brushing? Taking a shower for longer than you need to? Ignoring broken or dripping faucets? If you answered yes, this is exactly what I am talking about.

As anyone would expect, the sewer water from sinks, toilets etc. go through a sewage treatment before entering Lake Ontario. This ensures the proper treatment of it, even before it gets treated to be sent to households taps. However, each year, there are 40,000 catch basins which catch rain and snow melt, and lead that into the storm drainage system. When storm water and snow funnel through the catch basins, it goes straight to Lake Ontario, untreated. This is horrible in many ways. It is unhealthy for the creatures living in Lake Ontario, it will contaminate the other water in the lake, and citizens will end up using water that was not treated through the full cleaning system. Although storm water and snow melt are very different than sewer water, it should still be treated the way sewer water is treated. Afterall, it is for our own use.

ENERGY

As you can tell by the graph below, 55% ( OVER 1/2!!!) is nuclear electricity. Nuclear electricity is one of the worst types of generators! This is unsustainable due to the its critically negative impacts it has toward the earth. Nuclear reactors can cause major pollution. Also the generation of nuclear electricity itself, uses an extremely large amount of water, which is contributing to depletion of water. This also has a side effect where it creates a large amount of nuclear waste.

Although the other half of this graph is filled with better, more environmentally-friendly alternatives (hydro, wind etc.) to electricity generation, it needs to be higher.

Another huge issue is that most people use the dirtiest type of gasoline in their cars, mainly because it is the cheapest and it is more affordable than the other cleaner gasoline. This is a big problem since this obviously causes more air pollution than the clean types of gas.

SOLUTIONS

Given all the critical issues, we can definitely concur them all! As a community, as a city, as citizens, we can take action as soon as possible.

1. Bring awareness to Mississauga! Despite the fact that we are all aware these issues, some people may not take them into account in their own daily lives. We should educate and teach the citizens of Mississauga through common forms of PSAs, such as TV commercials, public posters, YouTube ads, and more.

2. It is also important to conserve water and energy in our everyday simple tasks. Simply by turning off the taps while brushing your teeth, taking quick and efficient showers, fixing broken, dripping faucets. You can also turn off any devices when they are not in use, turning lights of when they are not being used, removing wires, such as phone chargers, out of power outlets and more.

3. Use LED lights in replacement of incandescent lights. Mississauga does have LED streetlights, but more people should be using LED lights at home. LED lights are more energy efficient since they use less energy but produce more light.

4. Use dual-flush toilets instead of regular toilets. These are not very common although they should be. A regular toilet tends to use a lot more water than it needs to, to flush. A dual-flush toilet has two options, one big and one small, for the capacity of the water in the flush. So you can choose either option depending on what you need, saving water.

5. Make clean gas prices as least as possible. This will definitely encourage people to buy gas that is better for the planet.

6. Install more electric car charging stations! Obviously electric cars are more energy efficient than regular gas cars. By putting out more charging stations, this will encourage people to buy them, since they are assured that there are easy and convenient ways to maintain the car. There are actually a few electric car charging stations in Heartland Centre, but there should be more!

7. We should also reduce our reliance on the generation of nuclear electricity. Although nuclear electricity may produce more electricity than other ways, it is very bad for the earth. I am not an expert but I think we can easily do this by switching to hydro electricity! But 25% of Ontario`s overall daily electricity is produced by hydro. I think we can still increase that amount since we have huge bodies of water nearby such as Lake Ontario or even Niagara Falls.

8. To prevent untreated snow melt and rain from entering Lake Ontario, Mississauga can create a budget towards leading it somewhere else. We have all the technology and tools but I think the only reason why they are holding back on this is because of the money that the city cannot afford.

For more ways to conserve energy and water, watch the following video:

FOUND ON: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Px-g52pVGf0