We met with two tour guides from the Bill Gates Discovery Center. They gave information on a topic that doesn’t usually come to mind when you think of water pollution. We learned about how Western flush toilets(most toilets used in America) take gallons of drinking water to flush. Which is a limited resource as it is, meanwhile, it’s not like we’re drinking from our toilets! Not to mention that they are anything but affordable. Toilets aren’t accessible to everyone, and using the restroom might mean something entirely different to someone on the other side of the world.

At the Bill Gates Discovery Center, scientists are working hard to create more efficient and affordable toilets that solve as many problems in one model. Some of the prototypes don’t even require water to flush, also known as a “water-less flush.” More environmentally friendly toilets could be one of the keys to preventing water pollution, and at the forefront of encouraging water conservation.

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Linda Escalante communicates the needs of the environment to public officials to pass bills such as the Clean Water Act, and other movements to better care for our surroundings. She works for the NRDC. Linda is important to our topic because being able to inform others on critical issues is extremely important in order to work together and get things done.

During the interview, Linda explains how impact water preservation in how most wars are over resources that provide economical power, not just water but other crops and items, as well as as how literally everything we do or create comes with a cost to the environment. Even though dying from unclean water seems like a distant past, many are still falling to contaminated water. This is because of many companies and cooperation dumping toxic waste into water ways, spreading throughout all water via trans-boundary contamination.

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Jennifer Bombardier is a part of the Lower East Side Ecology Center, contributing to green infrastructure, and changes for water preservation and cleaning. She claims that water is essential for everything, recreation, drinking, cooking, and many other daily activities. Toxic waste is commonly, illegally, dumped into our waterways, harming both humans and animals. Heating and cooling systems in buildings are major contributors to global warming because of how much fossil fuels they produce.
Rain and waste water are being stored in the same areas, polluting the rain water that could have been cleaned and turned into drinking water. People should try and conserve water as much as possible, especially when it rains.

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We met with Sofia Zuberbuhler-Yafar, architect for the city and green infrastructure. Sofía Zuberbühler-Yafar is Program Director for the Sustainable Infrastructure Unit with the New York City Department of Design and Construction. She is important to our topic because she provided a lot of information regarding sewage problems in NYC and how green infrastructure and sustainability is the future of our society, and how it can save our water, and work toward the slow of Climate Change.
She has over 19 years of experience in Urban Design and was able to inform us of the city’s measures to combat water pollution through water basins, and other ways to save energy during rainstorms and through more Eco-friendly farming.

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Last week in school my group presented their social justice project presentation 101. This was our first attempt at sharing initially research with our peers. I wasn’t very nervous because I did my reading and had worked on the slides. Personally this was my major reaction to what we read, “It is important because at this rate, we’ll all die of drought or climate change, both having to deal with human footprint, waste, and terrible decision making. – TG”. My group has not yet received any emails back but we are going to be reaching out to different organizations and individuals in the near future.

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