The Colorado River is struggling and faces a shortfall that will forever shape the West.
An easy enemy to blame is agriculture.
But are there other unseen culprits?
There are, according to Yaron Dycian, the chief strategy and product officer of Wint.
Dycian points to massive buildings that do not even know how much water is being wasted.
His goal is to reduce the water waste that comes from buildings that would otherwise go to the Great Salt Lake or the Colorado River.
An AI-powered water management solution detects leaks and anomalies early to eliminate waste. It’s already helping commercial and residential properties in the U.S. and around the world, including in Colorado River–dependent states across the Southwest.
Buildings and water
Much of the water used in buildings is being wasted, Dycian said.
“We are a technology company to reduce the water and the bill,” he said. “The solutions are pretty simple. Over time you know what is the simple water application and what is normal, and what is not.”
Commercial buildings have a high waste of water, he stressed, but owners do not know that. Water, hence money, is literally going down the drain.
Take one flush, and it’s two gallons. Often the toilet flushes again, even if the user does not need it. Sometimes the faucets come on even if your hands are not there.
“It is 24/7 waste,” he said. “That is why (there can be so much waste) in the building.”
Wint has developed a system that can detect those issues and offer solutions. Think of it as secondary water metering, but instead of being applied to landscapes, it is used in structures such as the Empire State Building and casinos in the West.
“It is not an easy thing,” he conceded, but when buildings are wasting so much water there has to be a simpler way, a more efficient way.
Over a time period of seven years, he mentioned a building that needlessly lost 100,000 gallons of water per year through waste.
It may not seem to be much, but in the arid Southwest plagued by drought, every drop of water counts.
“It is an industry wide mistake. Water is not managed at all in buildings,” he said.
Dycian pointed to a commercial building in which the sun would shine into the urinal.
The LED trigger point would make the toilet flush and flush and flush some more. Until the sun went in another direction, there was the repeated flush for no reason.
“The amazing thing is, if you think of legitimate use, even if it is at a high flow rate, it is very intermittent. It can go on and on. It will flow for 15 seconds or a minute. You have a minute of legitimate use versus 24/7. That is why the waste takes up so much coming into the building.”
It is somewhat of a revolutionary idea to tackle water waste through buildings.
“Water is an important thing, but nobody manages it,” he said.
That may be a solution to help the Colorado River, if people dare.